LIVE Mock Draft + Confusing Players

Summary

Fantasy Footballers Podcast Summary: LIVE Mock Draft + Confusing Players

Episode Title: LIVE Mock Draft + Confusing Players
Release Date: August 24, 2018
Hosts: Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, Mike "The Fantasy Hitman" Wright
Description: The Fantasy Footballers trio delves into a live mock draft, discusses the most perplexing player rankings for the 2018 season, and shares expert strategies to help listeners dominate their leagues.

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1. Introduction

The episode kicks off with Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright welcoming listeners to a live mock draft session. The hosts emphasize the significance of draft weekend, setting the stage for an in-depth analysis and strategic gameplay to maximize fantasy football success.

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2. Current NFL Updates Impacting Fantasy Football

Charles Sims Placed on Injured Reserve At [08:37], Mike Wright announces that the Milwaukee Bucks have placed running back Charles Sims on injured reserve, likely signaling the end of his NFL career. Jason Moore adds, “[09:27] The guy flashed several times, but he can’t stay healthy. His body’s breaking down.”

Marlon Mack's Readiness for the Season Mike Wright discusses Colts Head Coach Frank Reich's uncertainty about running back Marlon Mack's availability for the season start ([09:15]). Jason Moore elaborates, “[10:18] Marlon Mack will start the season, but Bobby Turbin will take over once Mack is healthy.”

Richard Matthews' Injury Update At [11:06], Mike Wright provides an update on Richard Matthews of the Jacksonville Jaguars, recovering from a torn meniscus. Jason Moore weighs in, “[11:36] Rashard Matthews would jump back into the starting lineup over Tajai Sharp or Taywan Taylor.”

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3. Confusing Players to Rank for 2018

Lamar Miller Jason Moore identifies Lamar Miller as the most challenging player to rank ([04:37]). Despite being a starting running back for the Houston Texans, Miller's inconsistent performance makes him a perplexing choice. Mike Wright concurs, “Easy to catch, hard to rank” ([04:48]).

Chris Hogan Chris Hogan poses a ranking dilemma for Mike Wright ([06:10]). With uncertainty surrounding his role and past injury issues, Hogan's potential varies. Mike notes, “[06:48] It's been marred by different opportunities caused by injury.”

Jarvis Landry Andy Holloway discusses Jarvis Landry's value ([07:48]). While showing strong performance on "Hard Knocks," Landry's target volume remains uncertain without Josh Gordon, making his fantasy value volatile.

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4. Live Mock Draft

The hosts embark on a live mock draft, simulating a 12-team, half-point per reception (PPR) league from the 9th pick position.

a. Draft Setup

• League Format: 12-team, half PPR
• Mock Draft Position: 9th overall
• Draft Tool: Sleeper app

b. Round-by-Round Analysis

Round 1:

• Pick 9: Melvin Gordon
  Andy expresses confidence in Gordon, noting, “[15:15] If I was just me, it would have been Melvin Gordon in a second.”

Round 2:

• Pick 16: Marshawn Lynch
  Jason proposes, “Marshawn Lynch is the player I want here” ([27:59]).

Round 3:

• Pick 25: Dion Lewis
  Mike Wright selects Lewis as an insurance policy: “A nice insurance policy” ([29:49]).

Round 4:

• Pick 33: Corey Clement
  The team opts for Clement, aiming for a flexible flex play with potential red-zone value.

Round 5:

• Pick 42: Emmanuel Sanders
  Jason prioritizes Sanders over other WRs, emphasizing his high ranking: “[43:57] That's why I would have taken Powell instead of Rob Kelly and then taken a flyer on a wide out.”

Round 6:

• Pick 51: Trey Burton (Tight End)
  Andy selects Burton, employing a strategy to secure an elite tight end in the later rounds.

Round 7-12:

• The team continues to balance their roster, selecting players like Rob Kelly and Bilal Powell to bolster depth and flexibility.

c. Strategies Employed

Prioritizing RB and WR Early: The hosts agree on securing running backs and wide receivers in the early rounds to maximize weekly production. Jason Moore emphasizes, “[14:31] If you're going across the position, tier one running back is more valuable than tier one wide receiver.”

Tier-Based Drafting: Utilizing tiered rankings helps in making informed picks and avoiding positional runs. Mike Wright shares, “[14:36] We have tier-based rankings to avoid falling victim to runs.”

Waiting on Quarterbacks: The consensus is to delay quarterback selections, banking on the abundance of viable options later in the draft or via the waiver wire.

Flexibility and Depth: By focusing on versatile players like Corey Clement and Emmanuel Sanders, the team ensures flexibility in their lineup, adapting to week-to-week matchups.

d. Notable Picks and Exchanges

Dion Lewis over Rex Burkhead: The team opts for Dion Lewis instead of Rex Burkhead, citing a two-thirds majority preference. Mike remarks, “[30:53] We went running back heavy. We only came out of this draft with four wide receivers.”

Balancing Tight End Needs: Selecting Trey Burton in the sixth round ensures an elite tight end without sacrificing early-round positional needs.

Late-Round Quarterback Strategy: The team decides against drafting quarterbacks early, anticipating that quality options like Matthew Stafford and Philip Rivers can be acquired later.

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5. Best Ball Tips and Strategies

Jason Moore discusses Best Ball strategies, emphasizing the importance of tier-based drafting to maximize point potential without micromanaging daily lineups. “[49:45] Tier-based drafting is so important when you are playing Best Ball because runs are going to happen.”

Avoiding Position Runs: The hosts advise against chasing players during positional runs, instead focusing on value picks to strengthen the overall team.

Optimal Lineup Setting: In Best Ball leagues, setting the optimal lineup each week is automated, making it crucial to draft players with high weekly upside within their tiers.

Utilizing the Ultimate Draft Kit (UDK): The UDK provides comprehensive tiered rankings and cheat sheets, aiding in making informed draft decisions and avoiding filler picks.

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6. Closing Remarks

The mock draft concludes with the hosts reviewing their selections, expressing satisfaction with the balanced roster they've built. Andy Holloway states, “[48:44] Any draft where I get Trey Burton in the 8th and Big Ben in the 10th, I’m thrilled with because I know that the first seven picks were all studly running backs and wide receivers filling my roster.”

Mike Wright encourages listeners to review the full mock draft on their website and YouTube channel, ensuring that fans can visualize the strategy and apply similar tactics to their drafts. The episode wraps up with final tips on Best Ball drafting and a reminder to join their fantasy football community for ongoing support and insights.

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Notable Quotes:

• “Melvin Gordon in a second.” – Andy Holloway ([15:15])
• “Lamar Miller lands on his feet, and yet… he is a stinky pile of garbage.” – Jason Moore ([05:00])
• “Tier one running back is more valuable than tier one wide receiver.” – Jason Moore ([14:31])
• “In our listener league, there was some debate over the Joe Mixon, Jerick McKinnon.” – Jason Moore ([24:58])

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Key Takeaways:

• Strategy Over Hype: Prioritize consistent production over high-profile but inconsistent players.
• Tier-Based Drafting: Employ tiered rankings to make strategic picks and avoid positional runs.
• Flexibility is Crucial: Build a balanced roster with depth to adapt to weekly matchups and potential injuries.
• Best Ball Readiness: Utilize Best Ball strategies by focusing on high-upside players within their tiers.

This comprehensive mock draft session, accompanied by expert discussions on player rankings and drafting strategies, equips fantasy football enthusiasts with the knowledge to excel in their leagues for the 2018 season.

Transcript

[Andy Holloway]

Hey foot clan. Lowe's is my new go to destination for discovering the newest Craftsman products including mechanics, tool sets, storage and more in store and online. Like the 120 tooth ratchet, it has a 3 degree arc swing that lets you loosen or tighten bolts with less movement in those hard to reach spots. Plus comes in gunmetal chrome finish. It's not only sharp looking, makes them corrosion resistance. Pretty cool, right? So look, shop, vacation, the new home of craftsman today@lowe's.com footballers that's Lowes.com footballers. This is Jerry McKinnon, running back, San.

[Mike Wright]

Francisco 49ers and you're listening to the Fantasy Footballers podcast.

[Andy Holloway]

Welcome to the Fantasy Footballers podcast coming to you from Draft.com Studios with your hosts Andy Holloway, Jason Moore and Mike Wright.

[Mike Wright]

Oh, it's mock draft time.

[Andy Holloway]

Makalaka ding dong.

[Mike Wright]

What did you just.

[Andy Holloway]

Makalaka ding dong. Fellas, look, this is the biggest draft weekend of the year.

[Mike Wright]

Wait, just let it go, Mike. Just let it go. Just let it go.

[Andy Holloway]

It's the best and we're gonna mak a lockading dong.

[Mike Wright]

Let it go. He keeps it as long as he never says it again.

[Jason Moore]

No, he just did it again.

[Mike Wright]

Welcome to the Fantasy Footballers podcast. Andy and Mike are here.

[Jason Moore]

Not anymore.

[Andy Holloway]

I'm taking over the show.

[Mike Wright]

So I want to focus on one thing he said that wasn't that biggest draft weekend of the year, including our big league of record draft, right? Like the year 11 I think for our league of record draft on Saturday night.

[Jason Moore]

I cannot wait.

[Mike Wright]

Today's show is Friday, August 24th. We have the live show in Phoenix tonight and you got to hear that all you foot plan out there that aren't at the show, you'll get to hear it on Monday.

[Jason Moore]

I'll say this ballerslive.com but I cannot confirm or deny telling.

[Andy Holloway]

There's no reason. You're you. You were too late.

[Jason Moore]

Look, maybe there was two left, I don't know.

[Andy Holloway]

All right, go to ballerslive.com if you're in Phoenix. Check it out and you'll be sad. Or maybe you'll just be super excited. You'll be like, oh, there's a ticket.

[Mike Wright]

Follow us on Twitter at the ffballers. The website's the Fantasy footballers dot com. You can always join our community, get into a league, a last minute league as I call it. You got a couple weeks left before the season and that is jointhefoot.com if you want to get involved over there. We announced that Megalobol and we had over 700 people try to get into that. We had to cap it. I'm sorry if you didn't get in. We're going to look at expanding that next year. We just simply couldn't. We couldn't take a human life.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah, there's a human being that is commissioning this league of, you know, 600 people. Yeah, 600 people, 150 alternates.

[Mike Wright]

What were those called?

[Andy Holloway]

And hey, look, not only, not only speaking of the fact that this is the main weekend and you brought up, you know, look, you might have a last minute. You might be going, oh, my draft is this weekend. What do I do? And you flipped on this podcast and you're going to get some great info. But hey, go grab the ultimate draft kit if you're worried and you're thinking, I don't know what to do. I have not prepared. We got you covered. Go to ultimate draftkit.com and people say, oh, this is awesome. But there's too much information in here. I'm drafting tonight. What do I do? Just go to the principal cheat sheets, print them out. Word on the street is Those are worth 10, 20, $30,000 and we're selling it for 29 $29.

[Mike Wright]

That's the word on the street.

[Andy Holloway]

So I would, I would say great value. But check that out and you will love your draft. In fact, I got mine right here. I'm using for today's mock.

[Mike Wright]

I was going to say we've got a mock draft show. Half point per reception, 12 team league. We're drafting from the nine spot, the very same spot that Mike the fantasy Hitman drafted in our listener league the other day. Although that was a 14 team league also.

[Jason Moore]

Correction, dominated.

[Mike Wright]

Oh, is that what happened?

[Jason Moore]

I dominated from the nine spot.

[Mike Wright]

That's the beauty of, of the draft. Before the season starts, you, you know, you're defeated. Subjective, Very subjective. But Mike thinks he did well. We'll see what we do today. You guys can share your thoughts on our mock draft on the show. Quick question of the day. Who is the most confusing player to rank for 2018? Another way to put that might be the hardest player for you to rank. Our rankings are changing every day, but who's been the one that you just don't know where to go?

[Jason Moore]

I'll jump in here with the first one. And it was Lamar Miller. He is an extremely difficult cat to figure out because he is the starting running back.

[Mike Wright]

Easy to catch, hard to rank.

[Jason Moore]

This is true. Always lands on his feet, too. Okay, when you toss him out the window, this is what I've heard cat reference.

[Mike Wright]

I try to toss him out the window each year.

[Jason Moore]

Yeah, we've tried to do that. And yet here he is as the starting running back for the Houston Texans. And Deshaun Watson, he looks healthy. He looks mighty spry. He looks ready to go. And Lamar Miller, when. When desean Watson was just scorching the earth. Lamar Miller was a running back one. He was very productive for fantasy football. And yet the rest of the time he was a stinky, stinky pile of garbage. He got benched for Alfred Blue at the end of the season, which.

[Andy Holloway]

That has to be embarrassing.

[Jason Moore]

What for Alfred, when Alfred Blue look the. The equivalent, the fantasy football club.

[Mike Wright]

Be nice. Be nice is like we said.

[Jason Moore]

Okay, Jason, you're out. Brian Catchron is in.

[Andy Holloway]

Oh, no, that's. That's too much.

[Jason Moore]

We have replaced you with a loser.

[Andy Holloway]

That loser does not belong here. So he lost to me in the championship, the listener league, last year. He belongs in the gutter.

[Jason Moore]

My point is, what do you do with a guy who's. He's a starting running back for what should be a good offense and you.

[Mike Wright]

Reluctantly rank him higher than you want to?

[Jason Moore]

Yeah, I get you. You want to. You want to put him in a body bag, but he's a zombie. And he's back.

[Mike Wright]

Oh, just replete with analogies today. Chris Hogan is the hardest player for me to rank. I brought this up the other day. I know you love him. Easy peasy, I know you love him. But for me it's been difficult because I just haven't, you know, you haven't seen a year, you know, that wasn't marred by injury, marked by different opportunity caused by injury. This year you've got no Edelman to start the season. I just don't know what to do with Hogan because I can see him being a pretty good wide receiver. 3 and I can see him having wide receiver 1 weeks with Tom Brady, especially at the beginning of the season. That makes him difficult to ring.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah. And my, my guy that is just so hard is Jarvis Landry. Bless him. Because Jarvis Landry is dominating the television screen right now on Hard Knocks. He looks great. So he's getting that kind of, that just publicity bump. Right? That's all it is. If you saw the blessing bump. The blessing bump. And I know that he is a great, an absolutely great wide receiver, but we haven't seen him with Josh Gordon. I still expect that this is a lower passing volume argument. If you listen to our live show in Philadelphia, which if you haven't go back and Listen, I kind of spoke some of the stats against Josh Gordon, and those apply to Jarvis Landry, but I also think he's really good. He's finished. You know, he had. He was with the Dolphins, which weren't a great team, and he was always finishing as a top 15 wide receiver. So I have a real struggle of deciding whether or not Jarvis will command anywhere near the targets that he's had so far over his entire career.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah, it's funny that Mike. Mike's confidence level in Hogan, who I have a difficult time ranking, is so high. And that's how I feel with Landry. Like, I just. He was almost my fantasy mvp. It was. It was Diggs or Landry before the show. I have confidence in him, but I get it. I get what you're saying. And he does have a lot of notoriety right now. And you can be in an incredible, amazing, wonderful NFL player, and it doesn't always translate into being the best fantasy player in the game. So I hear you check out footclank giveaway.com if you want a chance to enter and win an autograph DeAndre Hopkins jersey, a couple copies of Madden, and we're giving away the UDK for life. So if you already got the ultimate draft kit, we'll just send your money back your way, and then you can have it every year. You'll be one of the most esteemed individuals on this good earth.

[Andy Holloway]

Your friends will love you.

[Mike Wright]

Really? I think they'll hate you.

[Andy Holloway]

Oh, they probably won't know about it. You don't. Nobody shares. They're like, oh, you guys should. You guys should have more followers on YouTube. But I won't tell anybody about it.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah, they'll know by way of defeat.

[Andy Holloway]

That's true.

[Mike Wright]

Like, they'll be smashed. I've got a couple bits of news before we get into the mock draft, because I want to get that going. First of all, this turned a different direction. The Bucks have once again placed running back Charles Sims on injured reserve. I imagine he'll be released with an injury settlement at some point soon, but this is just disappointing for Charles Sims. I just don't see a future for him anymore. This has been too many times.

[Jason Moore]

No, it's. It's got to be the end of the career for Charles Sims, which is unfortunate. The guy flashed several times, but he can't stay healthy. His body's breaking down.

[Mike Wright]

All right. Frank Reich, head coach of the Colts, says it's no slam dunk, that Marlon Mack will be ready for the start of, oh, the NFL season. Mike, are you just brimming with excitement? I mean, here, let me. I got to bring something up, and maybe the people out there, they're going to give you a hard time over it. I would. You dropped Christian Michael in our Dynasty league the other day.

[Jason Moore]

I did.

[Mike Wright]

You did it for who?

[Jason Moore]

I picked up Bruce Ellington, and that was just.

[Mike Wright]

That's just not on brand, Mike.

[Andy Holloway]

It's not on brand. That was. That was because of Jordan Wilkins. Am I correct?

[Mike Wright]

That's a shameful drop.

[Andy Holloway]

Was that because of Jordan Wilkins?

[Jason Moore]

Yes. Yeah. Jordan Wilkins was getting first team reps.

[Mike Wright]

So, I mean, you hear this news about Mack not being ready and you. If you had to start one today, you had to lock it into your. Into your spot for week one. Who are you starting in Indianapolis? Jordan Wickens?

[Jason Moore]

No, it'll be Kristen Michael. Kristen Michael will start the season. Look, as the resident Kristen Michael Truther, who has also accepted what reality is. He's going to start. He's going to be the starting running back for the Indianapolis Colts for a couple of weeks. He's not going to be the starter for the entire year, though. As soon as Bobby Biceps Turbin returns, he will. If Marlon Mack is not ready to go, then Robert Turbin will be the starter after the four weeks or as long as he's recovered from his ankle injury.

[Mike Wright]

But Bruce Ellington. Mike.

[Jason Moore]

Yes. You're Darn. No, not. No, no, no, no. Not at all. Wide receivers are hard to find, and the fact that Bruce Ellington was on the waiver wire and I did not realize. That's the shame. That's the shame on me.

[Mike Wright]

Whatever. All right. Richard Matthews is recovering from surgery to repair a torn meniscus. We finally have an answer for why Richard Matthews has been missing so much time.

[Jason Moore]

Why so secretive?

[Mike Wright]

I don't know. It's a very secretive meniscus. His meniscuses are in the shadows, apparently. So he could be activated from the PUP as early as next week. Does he vault right to the top of your list? Does he vault to right beneath Corey Davis in Tennessee?

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah, he'll be.

[Jason Moore]

He would vault pretty much close, like neck and neck. I'm going to give the edge to Corey Davis of the potential of the breakout. But Rashard Matthews would, in my estimation, jump right back into the starting lineup over Tajai Sharp, over Taywan Taylor, over anyone they want to use. Rashad Matthews is. Is a good wide receiver.

[Mike Wright]

Jason, you got any other news you want to share with the people? I mean, it doesn't even have to be about fantasy football. Just any news at all? Anything you got going on? No, I mean, have you given up the whole mock. Makalaka. Whatever you just said.

[Andy Holloway]

Makalaka. Ding dong.

[Jason Moore]

Here's the thing. Here's the thing. He had already forgotten about it.

[Andy Holloway]

I did.

[Mike Wright]

I'm so sorry.

[Jason Moore]

And you brought it back up.

[Andy Holloway]

Thank you. No. I can't wait to do this mock draft. I want to, I want to get into it.

[Mike Wright]

All right, let's do it.

[Andy Holloway]

The fantasy footballers mock draft.

[Mike Wright]

All right. Sharing is caring. And we're sharing a team today. Drafting from the nine spot and a 12 team half point per reception mock draft live on the show once again using what we've used all year, the sleeper app. The sleeper draft board is sweet. We've done all of our mocks on it. If you go to YouTube, you can see it, you can see us walk through the draft round by round. And what I love is if you already have the sleeper app on your phone, I love that almost every time I open the app there's a pop up that tells me that like seven or eight updates that they've made. It's been years working hard over there. It's been years since a company was forward thinking when it comes to league design and app design and things like that. So I'm appreciative of the fact that when something isn't perfect, they just go and fix it. We're starting at the number nine spot. So here's the first round so far. Todd Gurley, number one, David Johnson, number two, Lev Bell off the board at three, Antonio Brown goes four, Zeke at five, Fournette at six, Barkley at seven, Camara at eight. And here we are at the nine spot. A number of choices to be made. This is generally the spot where I think, you know, do you, do you begin thinking wide receiver options? Mike, is there somebody that jumps out to you? Melvin Gordon.

[Jason Moore]

Sure.

[Mike Wright]

Sitting there on the clock. Somebody that I know we, we believe in.

[Jason Moore]

And I will say this, we get asked a lot about for the tiered rankings. Okay, well how do you compare tiers? Because a tier 2 running back compared to a tier 2 wide receivers, this is not apples to apples. What's more valuable? And the way that I look at it, essentially a, through the first three tiers, if you're going across. So from. So tier one running back, tier one wide receiver, the running back is more valuable through the first three tiers. Does that.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah, you believe the first. Basically the first three tiers, as in.

[Jason Moore]

If you're going across, across the position. So A tier three running back, the way that we have it, is more valuable than a tier three wide receiver.

[Mike Wright]

Sure.

[Andy Holloway]

Yes. And I completely. I completely agree with, with what you're saying.

[Jason Moore]

And then after that, it kind of switch over, switches over, that the wide receiver is going to produce more on a weekly basis than the tier four running backs.

[Mike Wright]

So Hopkins, Beckham, they're the two wide receivers that jump out. Maybe Julio Jones is in that conversation, should be at running back. You're really looking at Gordon as the only one kind of in that upper tier. I'm not thinking about McCaffrey here. I'm not thinking about Cook or Hunt or McKinnon or Freeman.

[Jason Moore]

People are starting to think about McCaffrey in this spot.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah. I think he's not there for you. Sure. Well, he's not there because I think he might come back to us. I mean, there's a chance. There's a world where we get him in the second round. And I think I would go, Gordon, that's my pick here.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah, there's no doubt. I mean, if I was. If this was just me, it would have been Melvin Gordon in a second. And I know that that's your answer, Mike, because last night it is at the nine spot. You were. You were hoping and praying. Yes. And wishing for Melvin Gordon to get to you. It didn't happen, but it did today. So let's take him and see what happens.

[Mike Wright]

Oh, my heart broke because I took Melvin Gordon. The next six off the board before we came around in the second round were Beckham, Hunt, Thomas, Julio and Hopkins. And lo and behold, directly before our pick, Christian McCaffrey, gone. He said. That was why I took the chance, too. It's like I wasn't going to take McCaffrey over Gordon. But the chance of getting McCaffrey in the second round, right now it seems like it's changing day by day and not going to happen in very many leagues. So here we are, the big wide receivers, they all went. Beckham, Thomas, Julio, Hopkins, Hunt and McCaffrey are gone.

[Jason Moore]

Now.

[Mike Wright]

What. What's going through your mind? We have Gordon on the roster, I.

[Andy Holloway]

Would say, you know, when I look at the board and who's available, there's kind of a four pack, if you will, of players that are worthy of being taken at wide receiver. Devonte Adams and Keenan Allen, those guys are still elite, absolute wide receiver, ones that you'd be happy to have on your team. Got no problem.

[Jason Moore]

We'd be dubbed Chargers. And that question gets asked a lot. Are you okay going, Gordon?

[Andy Holloway]

Then Keenan allen right away, 100% fine with that stack. Although I did also mention Devonte Adams. And then on the other side, Dalvin Cook is still there, as well as Devonta Freeman. Freeman usually goes a little later than this, but because we're, you know, nearer to the back end, it's going to be a long time before we pick. If I had the entirety of this pick, I would. I would probably go with Keenan Allen.

[Mike Wright]

Now, Mike, you. You know, you just named a fantasy MVP couple. Couple days ago.

[Jason Moore]

I did.

[Mike Wright]

His name was Rob Gronkowski. This is. This is at the tippy top of where this is.

[Jason Moore]

This is on the edge. They got. The toes are peeking over the cliff and.

[Mike Wright]

Toes are over the cliff.

[Jason Moore]

Yeah, the toes.

[Mike Wright]

You climbing upside down.

[Jason Moore]

How does it.

[Mike Wright]

How do the toes.

[Andy Holloway]

You've never already up on the edge.

[Mike Wright]

Okay. You're up on the edge.

[Jason Moore]

You've never stood on the edge.

[Mike Wright]

I'm just anything. I'm visualizing this. And I want to know.

[Jason Moore]

Because when you step to the edge, the first thing that goes over are your toes.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah.

[Jason Moore]

You don't go heel. You do not go heels first.

[Mike Wright]

I was going up the mountain. You're going down. You're taking a look out over the canyon. I was climbing it.

[Andy Holloway]

No, Mike's waiting to take that jump.

[Jason Moore]

I'm not climbing anything, Gronkowski. That's way too much work.

[Andy Holloway]

It's far easier. I take a chopper to the top, and then I jump down.

[Jason Moore]

You can't stop me, no matter who you are.

[Mike Wright]

All right, so this is the end.

[Andy Holloway]

It's too early.

[Jason Moore]

It's too early because it's just the toes. And I said, he's my mvp. But if I'm at the beginning of the second round, if I'm at the beginning of the second round, I can't.

[Mike Wright]

Do it because I don't want Cook. Guys, you can't talk me into Cook here.

[Andy Holloway]

Okay? I don't blame you. I've been cooling on Cook. I do still believe that Dalvin Cook has the upside.

[Jason Moore]

I do my cooking by the book.

[Andy Holloway]

Five back. But.

[Mike Wright]

And I'm going to spoil this. I mean, we had a chance to talk to Kyle Rudolph.

[Andy Holloway]

Yes.

[Mike Wright]

And he insinuated that one of the more impressive players in camp has been Latavius Murray, somebody who injured to start the year last year. I have him scoring eight or nine times, and there's no reason, if he's productive, for them to stretch out Cook. I think Cook is a lower tier than where we have him as a consensus.

[Jason Moore]

So disagree Because I still think Dalvin Cook catches 50 plus receptions.

[Mike Wright]

Okay, well, that's fine.

[Jason Moore]

Which boosts his value a ton. Even if latavius is taking McKinnon.

[Mike Wright]

Howard, do you just double up with Chargers here and go Keenan Allen? He's the only guy in our second wide receiver tier. According to the tiered cheat sheet.

[Jason Moore]

If I cannot slide, slide Dalvin Cook past you, then I would go with Keenan Allen.

[Mike Wright]

Well, let's just go double Chargers and see what happens. Dalvin Cook went next.

[Jason Moore]

Of course he did.

[Mike Wright]

Rob Gronkowski, Jordan Howard, Devonta Freeman, Devonte Adams, A.J. green, Ty Hilton and Joe Mixon round out the second round. Coming back around, Diggs, McKinnon, Evans, Henry McCoy, Collins, Hill.

[Andy Holloway]

Freeman.

[Jason Moore]

What the. Royce Freeman.

[Andy Holloway]

No. You know, Royce Freeman is one thing.

[Jason Moore]

That's where he's going now.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah, but I was going to say Derek Henry. By the way, Derek Henry went ahead of Lashelle McCoy in this draft. And if you had to give me a second candidate of most difficult to rank players, he would be that.

[Andy Holloway]

He was on my short list for sure. No. My, my. Wow. And this isn't. This still isn't the player I would take here. But my wow, is that what is happening between Diggs and Thielen? I mean, when you left last season, Adam Thielen was at the back of the second round, and now he's basically falling out of the third, whereas Diggs was like a fourth, fifth rounder. And he's just skyrocketed to the point where, I can't remember the last draft where I saw Adam Thielen drafted ahead of Stefan Diggs. And now we've got an entire round where Diggs. Diggs was the first pick in the third round. We're at the ninth, and Thielen is still on the board.

[Jason Moore]

Let me ask you this. How many Minnesota Miracles is Adam Thielen responsible for?

[Andy Holloway]

Zero.

[Mike Wright]

That's a good point.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah.

[Jason Moore]

And you know how many miracles you need to remain a fantasy God forever?

[Mike Wright]

Just one.

[Andy Holloway]

Guessing.

[Jason Moore]

One.

[Mike Wright]

One. It's a little Blossom bias, too. I mean, he came out on fire with Cousins. Everyone wants to know what the rapport is going to be. Who's his favorite guy?

[Andy Holloway]

Great.

[Jason Moore]

He's.

[Mike Wright]

And we talked about it. He's my fantasy mvp because the separation makes him the best target for Kirk Cousins.

[Andy Holloway]

So I didn't. I didn't want to bring this up. It's still a thunder on the MVP show, but I desperately want someone to take an Adam Thielen, Stefan Diggs, water bet with me.

[Jason Moore]

Oh.

[Andy Holloway]

Water Bet.

[Mike Wright]

If I'm not willing to put my fantasy MVP on the line there on a heads up bet, I mean, I don't get me wrong, I think it's 60, 40. I might lose this bet, but.

[Andy Holloway]

Oh, you're going to lose the bet.

[Mike Wright]

All right. Before we make, we should log that one week by week.

[Jason Moore]

Yes. Brooks, before we make our third pick, want to thank today's sponsor, Pristine Auction. The absolute only sports memorabilia place that you need to go. And it's on the Internet. It's available 24 hours a day. And they have new things.

[Mike Wright]

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[Jason Moore]

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[Mike Wright]

We also want to thank FanDuel. I am excited to play. FanDuel this year jumped in the $250,000 Survivor contest. It is free to enter free. All you have to do is go make the [e-mail] footballers and just enter. Week one took the Ravens. Week one Ravens in the Survivor contest. The wait is almost over. Football is here. That means FanDuel is ready to go. It's never been more easy, more fun to play. If you're not a fantasy expert, then FanDuel is clearly the place to play. They got something for everybody. Like I said, the Survivor contest. It's the biggest contest ever and look, it's going to be fun from week one to through the end of the season. Even before that, they got preseason fanduel going on to get into that free $250,000 survivor contest go to fanduel.com footballers that's fanduel.com footballers plus new users get a $20 bonus when they make the first deposit. Come play with [e-mail] footballers before we.

[Jason Moore]

Make this pick, there's a guy I want to talk about. Who is he went in as the second pick of the third round and that is Jerick McKinnon, running back for the San Francisco 49ers. I just want to get a temperature check, a heat check here for Jerick McKinnon because he was the hotness. I mean this was a locked, stone cold lock, second round pick and he got banged up and now he's a bit of a third round.

[Mike Wright]

There's a bit of a Doug Baldwin effect taking place with Jerick McKinnon where the excitement, all those things, they've died down because you haven't seen him on the field, you haven't got to see him flash. But we need to remember that Kyle Shanahan turned Carlos Hyde into a pass catching monster last year.

[Jason Moore]

Yes, he did.

[Mike Wright]

He now has a pass catching monster by trade in Jerick McKinnon. So I do think he is worthy of this pick and he's worth considering, you know. Do you want him more or less than Joe Mixon right now? I probably want him more than Joe Mixon.

[Andy Holloway]

That's a, that's a great. Those two guys. I've, I'm receiving questions all the time. In our listener league, there was some debate over the Joe Mixon, Jerick McKinnon. I asked Brooks the other day, who would you rather have? And I know that Brooks and I are both on the Mixon side. We would rather, straight up, we'd rather have Mixon than McKinnon. I actually drafted McKinnon ahead of Mixon and had instant regrets and went, ah, I should have gone. Joe Mixon, Carlos Hyde.

[Mike Wright]

And then he traded for him and.

[Andy Holloway]

Then I sure did.

[Jason Moore]

Carlos Hyde, who Andy pointed out was not a pass catcher and yet he received the fifth most targets at the running back position last year.

[Mike Wright]

It's just guaranteed production, right?

[Jason Moore]

88 targets for Hyde.

[Mike Wright]

We're on the clock. Melvin Gordon, Keenan Allen, our first two picks in this 12 team league. We got to make a pick. And there are some big boys at the wide receiver position. Jason talked about Adam Thielen. You've got Amari Cooper, you've got Doug Baldwin.

[Andy Holloway]

Ding, ding, ding, ding.

[Mike Wright]

You've got Larry Fitzgerald still on the clock. And the running backs, they've thinned out a little bit. You're in a different tier with Jiji and Kenyon Drake and Lamar Miller. I'm just kind of. There's no one jumping off the page to me. I'd Love to pick up another running back, but I think I have to go wide receiver here.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah. Doug Baldwin is a difference making wide receiver who should not be in the third round. This is because he's banged up. He's dropped. I talked about this on the MVP episode a couple days ago. The only worry here is that if we were to take Doug Baldwin, we're three picks away from the turn. So if you're, if you're late, if you're at the nine spot, the eight spot this weekend when you're drafting, you need to make sure that you look and go, okay, the next few picks before me, six guys come off the board. You know, if five running backs happen to come off, we're going to be.

[Jason Moore]

That would suck.

[Mike Wright]

Here's the nice thing though, is the players. Well, yeah, they're probably going to draft running back. There's only two running backs off the board between those teams. We've got to make a pick. Who is the best running back that you would pick? Right here, Mike. Is it Jay Ajayi?

[Jason Moore]

It is Ajayi of the remaining running backs. He is who I would hope. I'm with Jason. I would take Doug Baldwin here. I would play the game.

[Mike Wright]

All right.

[Jason Moore]

And hope that Ajay or maybe Lamar Miller comes back.

[Mike Wright]

I don't think they will, but we'll find out because this is about where Aaron Rodgers goes and come on, we lost the bet again. If you're watching on YouTube, you got, you got to see that Thielen, Aaron Rodgers, Amari Cooper, Lamar Miller, Kenyon Drake, and what's going on here once again, right before us, Jay, Ajayi, look, this is good. This is good for the listener.

[Jason Moore]

No, this is horse patootie.

[Mike Wright]

They need to see us.

[Andy Holloway]

There's a reason why they need to see us.

[Mike Wright]

Squirm a little, Mike.

[Andy Holloway]

Yes, there's a reason why this year running backs, if you don't take two early running backs, it gets really hard in this situation. There are. They deplete very fast. And right now it's like 80% of these first three rounds are the running backs. It's absurd. And so a lot of times you want to zig when the whole league is zagging and take advantage. Like Doug Baldwin is taking advantage of that he shouldn't have been there. But there is a limit where you run out of serviceable quality running backs. And now we're up to our fourth pick. We only have Melvin Gordon running back.

[Jason Moore]

There's still, there's still a quote.

[Mike Wright]

There's still Marshawn lynch is the player that I want here.

[Jason Moore]

Yes.

[Mike Wright]

Ingram's on the board. Lynch, carry on. Johnson, obviously with Ingram, you have to wait for a four game suspension for him to return to New Orleans. Got Dion Lewis, somebody that I am rising on a little bit more in Tennessee. They spent money to bring him in. You got Rex Burkhead, who'll be a nice, at a minimum, a nice top of the season type of guy.

[Jason Moore]

I mentioned there's two running backs here that I would take and it's Marshawn lynch and sexy Rexy Burke.

[Mike Wright]

My vote is Lynch. What do you say, Jason?

[Jason Moore]

It doesn't matter because we have two thirds.

[Andy Holloway]

That's fair.

[Mike Wright]

That's when you just say, oh, obviously it was Lynch.

[Andy Holloway]

Obviously it was Lynch.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah, we took Marshawn Lynch. Travis Kelsey went next. Juju Deshaun Watson, Brandon Cooks, Zach Ertz Ingram, one of the harder players to rank as well.

[Jason Moore]

Yes.

[Mike Wright]

Jarvis Landry blessing him in the fourth round. 11th pick. I like that pick. Chris Hogan. And then you come around to the fifth round. Jimmy Graham went off the board. Fitz, Goodwin, Gordon. What do you think of Goodwin going ahead of Tate Gordon, Demarius Thomas and Alan Robinson?

[Andy Holloway]

You know what I think?

[Mike Wright]

I know. I know exactly what you think.

[Jason Moore]

In front of that is correct. Yeah. In front of Demaryius Thomas and Alan Robinson. But like we talked about on the show yesterday, Allen Robinson, it's his 14:14 touchdown back with the Jacksonville Jaguars. That's.

[Mike Wright]

It's.

[Jason Moore]

That feels like a dream. You woke up in the middle of it and you're just. It's so fragmented that you can barely even see a picture of what he did and how awesome he was.

[Mike Wright]

But you get up and you look in your journal and you scribbled some numbers down in the middle of the night and they were like 1400 yards. And you're like, wow, he can do that. Yeah, but here's what I'm saying.

[Jason Moore]

But can he?

[Mike Wright]

He's gone. And here we are, we're in the fifth round. We've got two wideouts, two running backs. Gordon, Allen, Baldwin and Lynch. And now we have benefited from the running back. Heavy beginning. 10 wide receivers and only two running backs off the board after our lynch pick. Dion Lewis still on the board. Love it. Love the idea of picking up Dion.

[Andy Holloway]

Lewis here and Rex Burkhead still on.

[Mike Wright]

The board and Rex Burkhead still on the board. Either one I'm fine with. I'm very firmly in the running back camp here. The wide receivers, you can still go Corey Davis or Marvin Jones. Alshon Jeffrey.

[Andy Holloway]

No, I.

[Jason Moore]

There are.

[Mike Wright]

There's more depth at the wide receiver position later. I think I would jump into the running backs. Who's your vote? You also have Carlos Hyde, Chris Carson, Rashad Penney, Ronald Jones, etc.

[Andy Holloway]

We're both in agreement that it is firmly running back here, especially based on. This is where you have to take your team into account. So Marshawn Lynch, a little bit older, Melvin Gordon, they're okay. But our Keenan and Doug Baldwin stack. Our wide receivers are fine. And like you said, Andy, you can draft wide receivers for days. I mean, go to the 10th round, the 11th round, the 12th round, there's wide receivers I love. Not a lot of running backs there that I'm like, oh, man, I just really have to have this guy.

[Mike Wright]

So I think we agree also between Lewis and Burkitt.

[Andy Holloway]

Yes.

[Mike Wright]

Is that fair?

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Mike Wright]

Or would you have somebody else?

[Jason Moore]

Oh, it's between the two of them.

[Mike Wright]

For us. For the team that you're a part of right now.

[Jason Moore]

Yeah. Well, I thought the pick was Rex Burkitt. I had already moved on to the next round.

[Andy Holloway]

I would personally pick Dion Lewis.

[Mike Wright]

Burkitt. As would I. Oh, two thirds.

[Andy Holloway]

Get body.

[Jason Moore]

Oh, no. I knew it was gonna happen.

[Mike Wright]

I thought you said you knew we already took Rex Burkitt.

[Jason Moore]

No, in my head, we had already taken Rex Burkhead, but I knew that you buffoons would take Dion Lewis instead of Burkhead.

[Mike Wright]

That's a very strong language for players similarly ranked, Mike.

[Jason Moore]

Yeah, it is.

[Mike Wright]

All right. Dion Lewis, we took him because of 2/3. Vote. Rex Burkhead, Corey Davis, Tom Brady, Greg Olson, Carlos Hyde and Marvin Jones. The next six off the board. This show would never work with four people. You have to have an uneven vote.

[Andy Holloway]

Well, the judge here, so, I mean, he could. The judge Giamatti could overrule in one direction, but, you know, I did. So I just.

[Mike Wright]

We don't ask his opinion very often.

[Andy Holloway]

That's true. That's true. And if you're new to the footballers.

[Mike Wright]

Who would you have taken there? Brooks, who would you have taken?

[Andy Holloway]

Great question.

[Mike Wright]

Would you have taken Dion Lewis or Rex Burkhead? According to the secret judge Giamatti rankings, Dion Lewis, barely.

[Jason Moore]

No, it's fine. Yeah, this is fine.

[Andy Holloway]

What I was going to bring up is if you're new to the fantasy footballers. You just found us. You're listening, prepping for your show, you might go, why aren't they for their show, for their draft?

[Jason Moore]

The show is what we call the draft.

[Andy Holloway]

When you're going to the draft, that's the show. But they might be questioning why aren't we talking about quarterbacks? We haven't even brought up the potential of looking at a quarterback or at a tight end. Someone care to explain why?

[Mike Wright]

Look, Russell Wilson's still on the clock here in the sixth round. Arm is still on the. On the draft board here in the sixth round. We've had Brady Rodgers, Deshaun Watson go. We believe in maximizing the value you can find at the running back in the wide receiver position early in the draft. Because every team starts one quarterback and they have to start more running backs and wide receivers than they do quarterback and tight end. That's the philosophy. It's maximizing the value you find at the positions you have to play more of. More often than not, that means waiting. I mean. I mean, way more often than not, that means waiting late until you draft replaceable quarterback. You can get somebody in the seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth round at quarterback that can produce at an upper echelon level. You can find guys off the waiver wire because there's 12, 14 teams in your league and there are 30 to 40 quarterbacks that can put up week one type of numbers.

[Jason Moore]

Over the course of the season, over 40 quarterbacks will post a top 12 finish on the week. And you can predict those. You can find them. It's all about playing the matchup.

[Mike Wright]

So no temptation with Russell Wilson?

[Jason Moore]

Nope.

[Andy Holloway]

No. None here at all.

[Mike Wright]

So, Jason, why don't you take the baton, Tell us what you're thinking about with this sixth pick. We've got three running backs now. I feel like we've shored that position up immensely after going wide receiver. Wide receiver, yes.

[Andy Holloway]

We have done well there. This is where, you know, the sixth round, because we're nearer to a turn. I always look and I say, okay, our seventh round pick. Is it early? Is it late? Will we be able to get someone like Trey Burton to come back to us? I don't know if we will or not. So I would maybe think about it here if there wasn't another player that I liked. But I believe there are still wide receivers on the board that can shore up our team, help us more if we miss out on someone like Trey Burton at the tight end position. I'm fine. Personally, I.

[Mike Wright]

You've got a couple, Sean and Julian Edelman.

[Andy Holloway]

Julian Edelman, Emmanuel Sanders. Those three guys are, I think, in the sixth round, a really good value to help a team out.

[Jason Moore]

Even with. Wow, really? I feel like I'm the only person who's wanted to draft Julian Edelman with his four game suspension.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah, I mean I, I have a.

[Mike Wright]

Much higher than Sanders. I don't want to consider Sanders here. I'd consider Edelman and Jeffrey well above them.

[Andy Holloway]

I would prefer to not have Edelman and deal with a bench spot that does. You know that you can't make a transaction from. You can't go into Week 1 after the game's play and say, oh, I got to make a bid on this guy. Who am I going to drop? I've got to drop someone else from my bench.

[Jason Moore]

The same. Sorry. The same could be said for Alshon. You're. You're being held ransom right now. You don't know if Alshon is going to start the year on the Puppets.

[Mike Wright]

I agree with that. Let me ask you this though. Any chance you want to take a home run shot on either Rashad Pinney or Sony Michelle here? Because in hindsight we could have gone Burkhead come back and got Michelle. It had those two backfield pieces. But then you're wasting two picks on the, on a difficult to predict backfield.

[Jason Moore]

Personally, I would not have wanted to do that. And I think if I'm going in on the, the gamble for Sony Michelle, I'm, I'm not going to do it right here. I'm going to wait.

[Mike Wright]

So I think Trey Boo Boo, if that's the target. If we want to look at Trey Burton, Adam Shaheen, the other tight end in Chicago, he's banged up Burton a lot of press lately. Oh, he could, you know, he could break the yardage record for the tight end position in Chicago. Say whatever you want. You follow the money. Trey Bird got paid a lot to come in and be Travis Kelsey in that Matt Nagy offense. I love targeting him. I would like to play the game though and see if he comes back to us in the seventh round.

[Andy Holloway]

Well, and right now there are four quality tight ends on the board. Evan Ingram, Kyle Rudolph, Delaney Walker and Trey Burton. So I'm fine playing.

[Mike Wright]

Rolling the dice.

[Andy Holloway]

Rolling the dice and see if one of those four guys.

[Mike Wright]

There are also five that have been drafted. So unless other teams prioritize tight end right here, right now, there's a chance he comes back. So it's between Jeffrey and Edelman. Who do you. Who's your vote? I would vote. I would vote Alshon.

[Andy Holloway]

I would as well. Yeah, I think he will absolutely be.

[Mike Wright]

There week one and we have the luxury of not needing him week one if that happened. All right, let's say he doesn't go on The. Here's what I mean.

[Jason Moore]

You'll not need him. I'm saying week five, too.

[Mike Wright]

He may not go on the pup, but he may be limited or not be a startable asset in week one, is my point.

[Jason Moore]

Yeah, it's just. It's a lot. Even you know, Julian Edelman, you know, he's gone for four weeks. You're are. You're planning to be without Julian Edelman for four weeks?

[Andy Holloway]

I'd rather do that.

[Jason Moore]

With Alshon, you just don't know what to plan for.

[Andy Holloway]

But I would rather. I would rather the situation where I don't know what to plan for. But odds are I'm not without him for six weeks. And this is why you're getting Alshon in the sixth round. I mean, if you didn't have any worry, then Alshon's in the fourth round and you're not getting a value.

[Mike Wright]

All right. We took a chance on Trey Boo Boo. And it's paid off, gentlemen. Crabtree went after him. And here's where not drafting a quarterback early helps because a lot of picks have now been used up on quarterbacks in these next. The rest of the sixth round, through the seventh round, until our next pick. Breeze, Wilson, Newton, Wentz and Luck all went. You also had Watkins dropping all the way to 7:05 in this draft. What do you think of Watkins going so far behind Tyreek Hill? It's like the gap has widened again. In the beginning of the offseason, Hill was going about four rounds higher than Watkins. Then it closed up. A lot of hype around Watkins. Now it's opened up again. Hill in third, Watkins in the seventh. Is this a steal of a pick? Potentially with Watkins?

[Jason Moore]

Potentially, of course.

[Mike Wright]

It's like we could have taken him.

[Jason Moore]

It's a. It's a confidence level, though. He. The. They've just shown you nothing throughout the preseason of Patrick Mahomes connecting and finding and heavily utilizing Sammy Watkins.

[Mike Wright]

All right, well, here we are on the clock now. We could take Trey Burton, but I'm going to give you an alternate idea.

[Andy Holloway]

Okay.

[Mike Wright]

Because we only got to wait six picks and Evan Ingram and Delaney Walker are still on the board. Most people have Evan Ingram ahead of Burden.

[Jason Moore]

Here's how a lot of people have.

[Mike Wright]

Walker ahead of Burden, and we could roll the dice.

[Andy Holloway]

I think you should, because what you do is when you're here, you look at the three teams between you. There's three teams that are picking. They each pick twice. One of them has a tight end already.

[Mike Wright]

Yes.

[Andy Holloway]

So if the other two both draft A tight end, you get the third one of, you know, essentially three good guys.

[Jason Moore]

The edge man's going to double up.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah.

[Jason Moore]

I mean, that could double up on tight end.

[Andy Holloway]

I mean, you always got to know your league, right? If you've got. If at that edge is that dumb guy in your league that just loves doubling up on tight ends to stick it to you.

[Mike Wright]

Well, let's ask the question, though. What's the advantage? Is there a player that's just. You have to have right now? Is it Robbie Anderson? He's still on the board. Emmanuel Sanders, Jordan Nelson, Randall Cobb at the running back position. You could go grab Isaiah Cruell, another starter for your roster. Peyton Barber a starter?

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah.

[Mike Wright]

I mean, James White, you know, I'm not looking at him there.

[Andy Holloway]

So Peyton Barber, Isaiah Crowell, Jamal Williams, those three guys are interesting to me. I also love Emmanuel Sanders in the seventh.

[Mike Wright]

So Crowell or Sanders, if you're here looking at three of each. Gordon lynch and Lewis at running back, Allen Baldwin and Jeffrey at wide receiver. With Jeffrey's unknown situation, you drafted him for value. Maybe you go wide receiver here.

[Jason Moore]

The pick would be Emmanuel Sanders for me, right here because he's just my highest ranked player by far. But I want to bring up a name because we need more information on him. At the time of this recording, we don't know, but if it came out, like, let's say, sleeper shot us an alert right now.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah.

[Jason Moore]

Rob Kelly is the starter for Washington. He is the starting running back for Washington. Would you have considered, or I should say, where would you consider taking him?

[Mike Wright]

Not there. Not with Isaiah Crowell on the board. A known starter, A younger, more versatile, more electric.

[Jason Moore]

Is he younger?

[Mike Wright]

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

[Andy Holloway]

Oh, than Rob.

[Jason Moore]

Than Rob Kelly.

[Andy Holloway]

Rob Kelly is always younger than you think.

[Jason Moore]

Yeah.

[Mike Wright]

Is he?

[Jason Moore]

I wouldn't be. So he might. Cromwell might be younger because I feel like he.

[Mike Wright]

They're the same age.

[Jason Moore]

Crowell got into the NFL when he was like 17 years old.

[Mike Wright]

But I was more like. This is more like of a mirror test. I would go Crows, Crows, younger, more fit, tight.

[Jason Moore]

Sure. But Rob Kelly projects to be on a better offense.

[Mike Wright]

They're the same age. And you're right. But I don't believe that the workload that Kelly's going to be given with Chris Thompson, with Adrian Peterson now with other options, Samajp Ryan coming back, I don't think it mandates a pick above Isaiah Corral myself.

[Jason Moore]

All right.

[Andy Holloway]

I'd agree.

[Mike Wright]

Emmanuel Sanders was the pick. We played. We played the game with Trey Boo Boo. Two rounds ago and it's paid off. He's still on the board. Trey Burton, we can't wait again. We got a long wait. We got to take him now and we did. That is Trey Burton in the eighth round?

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah, he's my fourth ranked tight end. To get him in the eighth round. This is very reminiscent of what the strategy was last year with Zach Ertz. You could, you could play that game, pay attention to the other teams in your league and get them in the seventh or eighth round. A guy who could finish as a top three tight end, those. When you get those late round picks who finish top three at a position that propels you on the whole season. So that's what you aim for with those onesie positions with quarterbacks and with tight ends.

[Mike Wright]

Are you ready to take to Rod Taylor in the ninth? Mike, is this the time for you?

[Andy Holloway]

What?

[Mike Wright]

I'm just playing.

[Andy Holloway]

Oh, my gosh. I didn't. If you want to Rod Taylor, you take him with your last.

[Mike Wright]

We took Trey Burton, some of the other highlights to, to round out the eighth round. Aaron Jones, the 11th pick of the eighth round, that's pretty late. If he ends up taking the job, that's a steal in the ninth round. You got Mike Williams, one of the guys I think has breakout potential this year. Couple more quarterbacks gone. Kirk Cousins, Jimmy Garoppolo. Mike, are there any quarterbacks that you're looking at here in the 9th or are you moving, you know, moving on to another wide receiver, another running back.

[Jason Moore]

At this point, still on the board. Matthew Stafford, top 12 quarterback last year. Philip Rivers, top 12 quarterback last year. Ben Roethlisberger, can't remember if he was a top 12 guy, but I'm pretty confident that he was. Matt Ryan, two years removed from being a top 12 quarterback. Jared Goff, top 12 quarterback. It's, you can wait at quarterback. You're going to find value. You're going to be all right.

[Mike Wright]

What about Peyton Barber here? He's still on the board.

[Jason Moore]

See, Peyton Barber is a starter here.

[Mike Wright]

In the ninth round. Isaiah Cruel's gone. You're not going to have a chance to grab another starter at this point. You're. I mean, Rob Kelly's there.

[Jason Moore]

I think the thing about Peyton Barber is he is the starter right now. I just don't believe he will be the starter the entire season.

[Mike Wright]

Sure. And I'm with you on that because I think this team struggles and I think Ronald Jones gets a shot at some point.

[Jason Moore]

Then we're just holding on to Peyton Barber. Maybe you grab him and you can trade him a couple weeks in if there's an injury and someone. He's a starting running back, but I think he stays on your bench and then you never actually get a chance to use him because he's not going to play above Melvin Gordon, Marshawn lynch or Dion Lewis.

[Mike Wright]

All right, we gotta, we gotta make six picks to close this draft out. So where are you leaning? Why don't I give you the pick? Mike, you could go Barber, you can go Clement, you can go Latavius Murray, Rob Kelly, you could slide over the wide receivers. Nelson Aguilar on the board now we have Alzheimer.

[Jason Moore]

Jeffrey, right.

[Mike Wright]

Do you consider going Nelson Aguilar in case Jeffrey's on the pup? Then you've got probably the best. Ertz is the best target, but you got the best wide receiver there.

[Jason Moore]

It's. I guess it's a terrible thing. But I'm going to take the other running back from the team. I'm taking Corey Clement, who has standalone value a week to week flex play. If he in fact does is the red zone weapon, then he's tremendous and he has running back. One upside. If something were to happen to J. I get it.

[Andy Holloway]

I would have taken Peyton Barber if the pick was given to me. I would rather have a guy that is locked in as a starter right now has a chance to keep the job. Maybe he won't, but maybe Corey Clement doesn't actually get the job that we're projecting.

[Mike Wright]

All right, we are. We did see three other quarterbacks go off the board. This is going to happen. You're going to be in your leagues and there are going to be some teams that grab a couple of the bigger names, whether for trade value, whether for, wow, I can't believe this name's still on the board in the 10th round. But Stafford Rivers and Ryan, three guys we would have been very happy with here in the 10th or later, they're gone. So now you're looking at Big Ben, Pat Mahomes, Marcus Mariota. Like it's thinning out a lot. We, we are going to need to make quarterback a priority at some point here unless you guys are comfortable with Torod Taylor.

[Andy Holloway]

I love Patrick Mahomes, I love Marcus Mariota. But both of them get off to a rough opening stretch of schedule. So you got to keep that in mind when you're, when you're drafting late. You know, Marcus Mariota has a good Week 1 matchup, but then after that it's rough. Patrick Mahomes gets off to a difficult start.

[Mike Wright]

We have A long wait for another draft.

[Andy Holloway]

There's three quarterbacks that I'm targeting in every draft. I want one of these three guys. It's Philip Rivers, Matthew Stafford and Big Ben. Those are my three targets this year. Philip Rivers just went three picks ago. Matthew Stafford, two picks go. I would personally grab Big Ben.

[Mike Wright]

You comfortable, Mike?

[Jason Moore]

Yeah, it's fine. I don't.

[Andy Holloway]

It's not a need. You don't.

[Mike Wright]

Let's say Big Ben's gone. Who are you targeting after that?

[Jason Moore]

Man, at that point, I'm looking at probably Alex Smith, who plays the car.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah.

[Mike Wright]

That's just such a different range of outcome situation to me. If you look at Big Ben and you say, look, I don't have confidence that he's going to be a top 10 guy all year, but the potential of Big Ben versus the potential of Alex Smith or Goff or somebody like that, we'll go with Big Ben here. I'm on board. You see some defenses going off the board. Goff actually did go and we came back around. We're sitting here filling the bench now with two bench spots left before kicker and defense. What do you think? Is there any situation here where you're wanting to grab a tandem of quarterbacks if you end up late, where you're saying, hey, I want to go back and forth between a couple guys and I don't want to fight for him?

[Andy Holloway]

No.

[Mike Wright]

Jason said he loves Pat Mahomes.

[Andy Holloway]

I hate the idea if you play in a one quarterback league or one tight end league. I can't stand the idea of drafting multiple quarterbacks or multiple tight ends. There are always reasons. You know, look, after your draft is over, there's going to be five quarterbacks that are startable from the waiver wire. So why roster another one?

[Mike Wright]

Well, I went with Rob Kelly, so you should be happy about that. I took Rob kelly in the 11th round here.

[Jason Moore]

I was happy because the player who I wanted you to take managed to come back, and that is Bilal Powell, who continues to sit at the bottom of your drafts for some reason.

[Andy Holloway]

It's because I can tell you why he sits at the bottom of the drafts. Right. He had a bad early offseason where people were saying he was on the roster bubble. Injuries on the team kind of took that away. He's. He's locked and loaded, but his ceiling. We know for sure that he's never going to take over and be the guy. He had the opportunities, has had injuries in front of him. But what else we know is that while he's in his current role, he'll be valuable for fantasy. He'll be a flex starter. You know, you'll be able to start this guy in your flex on, you know, at least half your week matchup. So to get him in the 12th round, I think is great value.

[Mike Wright]

All right, so we'll take Powell and finish the draft. Look, we only had three running backs before Kelly and Powell. I think it's a nice insurance policy.

[Andy Holloway]

We did four. We had Clement.

[Jason Moore]

Yeah. We had Corey.

[Mike Wright]

Oh, okay. He was feeling the flex spot.

[Jason Moore]

We're good.

[Mike Wright]

We.

[Jason Moore]

We went running back heavy. We only came out of this draft with four wide receivers, but those four are Keenan Allen, Doug Baldwin.

[Andy Holloway]

Ooh.

[Jason Moore]

Alshon. And Emmanuel Sanders. See, that's why I would have. I would have taken Powell instead of Rob Kelly and then taken a flyer on a wide out, but could have.

[Mike Wright]

Gone somebody like John Brown or Tyler Lockett. Michael Gallup, I would have preferred that, too.

[Andy Holloway]

The thing is, is right now on waivers after the draft, there's a handful of quality.

[Jason Moore]

That's exactly what I said.

[Andy Holloway]

Dede Westbrook. Dede Westbrook is on waivers. So if you didn't like your pick, drop him and pick up West. You don't have to go wide receiver. Crazy. There's no running backs left to grab on the waiver wire.

[Mike Wright]

So we'll be starting the season with Gordon and Lynch at the running back position, Big Ben at the quarterback position, couple Studs and Keenan Allen and Doug Baldwin, who should be the number one targets by far for their quarterbacks, and then Alshon, Jeffrey, Emmanuel Sanders, Corey Clement, Rob Kelly, and Bilal Powell with Trey Burton at the tight end position. Very happy. We waited a couple of rounds. Even if you don't like Jeffrey, Mike, we got Jeffrey and Sanders before we had to spin that Trey.

[Andy Holloway]

Boo.

[Mike Wright]

Boo.

[Andy Holloway]

Pick any draft.

[Mike Wright]

Pretty happy with this roster.

[Andy Holloway]

I'm. Any draft where I get Trey Burton in the 8th and Big Ben in the 10th, I'm thrilled with because I know that the first seven picks were all studly running backs and wide receivers filling my roster. And then at the end of the draft, I still go, wow, I have an elite quarterback and elite tight end, and I didn't make the mistake of wasting those early picks.

[Mike Wright]

Yeah. So you can check out the full draft board on the website. You can check it out on YouTube. We'll post it on there. You can see the whole mock draft. You can see what horrible offensive mistakes we made that you wouldn't have made in each and every round, but hopefully you enjoyed that. And we're going to jump into a little bit of best ball tip and tips and tricks. Yeah, we're going to be bringing it again because it's Friday. And just a reminder, get the sleeper app at. Sleeper app. That's that easy.

[Jason Moore]

That makes sense.

[Mike Wright]

Sleeper app.

[Andy Holloway]

Best ball bonanza brought to you by draft.

[Mike Wright]

All right. I think you've got yourself a tip for the people.

[Jason Moore]

I do indeed. And this is really just driving in the point. We're bringing the hammer. We brought the hammer on Thor's day yesterday. But tier based drafting is so important when you are playing best ball because you, when you're playing best ball, if you're not familiar with what it is, you head over to draft.comballers, you set up an account and the way it works is you draft. You draft 18 rounds and then you do nothing else. The computer picks your optimal lineup. You just add up the points and then at the end of the season, you get to see if you won or if you lost. So you gotta use those tiers because runs are going to happen. People are going to freak out. When you're in the middle of a draft, two running backs go. Then, oh, boom, boom, boom, five straight running backs have gone. And then you have to make the decision, do I fall in line here? Do I continue this run and I take my Tier 4 running back? Meanwhile, a Tier 2 wide receiver is still there, like an Amari Cooper. Amari Cooper, who is actually, he's in our tier 3. But if Amari Cooper is there, don't pass up on the value. Don't fall victim to the run. Do not let the draft bully you around.

[Andy Holloway]

You don't want to have the runs in the shorts. You got to make sure that you look ahead and make sure that you're prepared for when the runs happen, if you know what I'm saying.

[Mike Wright]

You know better than anyone I think.

[Jason Moore]

About runs and shorts.

[Andy Holloway]

And look, if your specialty, if you're wanting our tier breakdowns for that, those are in the udk.

[Mike Wright]

That's where no runs in the udk.

[Andy Holloway]

And also for everyone that has the ultimate draft kit, sometimes people, we get the question, where are the tiers in the udk? They're all that there is. So sometimes you're looking for like this separate sheet that's like, where's the tiers? If you just go to rankings, go to quarterback, rankings, go to running backs, any position you want.

[Mike Wright]

If you go to the cheat sheets, they're separated by color.

[Andy Holloway]

Yes. And on all the rankings page and on all the cheat sheets, they Are separated into tiers, groups of similar players.

[Mike Wright]

Very easy to do. And you can jump in. We've got a draft coming up. I'm excited. There will be food. There will be fun. And then ultimately you guys have. You guys both have more picks than I do, so I'm in trouble. You guys have. You guys have a lot. You got them loaded up.

[Jason Moore]

We are prepared.

[Mike Wright]

Why does it seem like you're playing together on the same team the way you've been excited for this draft? Well, you're both like, I've got like five picks in the first because here's.

[Jason Moore]

Something we do in our league because draft pick trading is fully allowed and fully legal. Well, to penalize people who sell out. And they. I'm going into the draft with a. With a. I'm going to be short three picks because I'm buying a bunch of players to go for my championship. If you exit our draft short on picks, you lose fab. Yeah.

[Andy Holloway]

You lose 10. You lose $10 fab per pick.

[Mike Wright]

Per pick that you don't have.

[Jason Moore]

And so Jason and I were the keepers. We. We maneuvered ourselves so we are the keepers of the fab. All fab runs through us. That's why we are united, because no one will have money.

[Mike Wright]

You are overestimating how much we care about our fab in that league.

[Andy Holloway]

Yeah. No.

[Mike Wright]

You think we're all going to come running for fab.

[Andy Holloway]

You don't need to run. You don't need to run. You're going to pay up if you want my picks because not available. I want to go into week one where I've just got. Look, I've got full fab. How much fab do you have, Mike?

[Jason Moore]

I'm going to have full fab.

[Andy Holloway]

Oh. A lot of the league doesn't. You want to know why? Because we got their picks.

[Mike Wright]

Because you're the keepers of the fab.

[Jason Moore]

And he's like, nah, man, it's. It's cool. I don't need the fab. Yeah.

[Andy Holloway]

Week one, you will lose her.

[Mike Wright]

Tempted to just beat you with no fab this year.

[Jason Moore]

Oh, I dare you. Yeah.

[Mike Wright]

I'm not going to take that dare. Look, if you are not a fantasy expert, remember, fanduel is clearly the place to play. We think of them for sponsoring the show. They got something for everybody. And if you don't believe me, just. How does this sound? This season, they're running the free $250,000 Survivor contest, the biggest one ever.

[Jason Moore]

Sounds great.

[Mike Wright]

How does that work? You pick one team to win each week. And you can't reuse that team again for the rest of the season. This locks before week one, so you got to sign up right [e-mail] footballers to get into the $250,000 Survivor contest, just go to fanduel.com footballers plus, new users get a $20 bonus when they make the first deposit on FanDuel. Come play with [e-mail] footballeters guys, enjoy your drafts. Gals, enjoy your drafts. Have fun this weekend.

[Jason Moore]

Be safe.

[Mike Wright]

Be responsible, smart. Bring home a championship with a sweet draft. Makalaka. Ding dong.

[Andy Holloway]

Goodbye. Thank you for listening to another episode of the Fantasy Footballers Podcast. Join our fantasy football community on JoinTheFoot.com and follow us on Twitter @The FF Ballers.