Fantasy Football Draft Rankings & Tiers | Quarterback Must-Have Targets, Busts to Avoid, and Sleepers (Ep. 2027)

Summary

FantasyPros Fantasy Football Podcast: Quarterback Draft Rankings & Tiers (Ep. 2027)

Date: May 18, 2026
Summary by FantasyPros Podcast Summarizer

---

Episode Overview

This episode delivers a deep dive into 2026 fantasy football quarterback draft rankings and tiers, focusing on must-have targets, potential busts, and intriguing sleepers. Hosts Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia), Jake Seely (The Athletic), and Derek Brown (DBRO, “The King of Bros”) break down the consensus positional tiers, scrutinize emerging trends, debate controversial placements, and support their takes with strong data and signature wit.

---

Key Discussion Points

1. Elite Tier Quarterbacks & Criteria

(03:04-14:52)

• Consensus Top Tier (FantasyPros): Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Drake May
  • Joey P.: Allen’s consistency is unmatched, finishing as a top 2 fantasy QB repeatedly. Lamar Jackson’s 2024 was an “MVP-caliber” year, and Drake May, with possible upgraded weapons, stays elite.
  • Jake Seely: Adds Jaden Daniels to the top tier, citing his “QB6 as a rookie” and “nearly 50 rushing yards per game.” Argues Daniels’ supporting cast and coaching should see him rebound to 21+ fantasy points per game (04:33–06:46).

    “If you can be a capable quarterback and run for 800–900 yards, you’re going to be in Tier 1 for me.” — Jake Seely (06:16)

  • DBRO: Cautious on Lamar Jackson — ranking him QB5 due to age, injury volume, volume of rushing attempts, and unproven new OC. Highlights poor accuracy metrics and a concerning finish to last season (07:35–09:18).

    “Through weeks 9–18… Lamar Jackson was QB20 in fantasy points per game.” — DBRO (08:38)

  • Jake & Joey rebut: Even in down years, Lamar’s rushing upside establishes a high floor. Jake cites play-action rates and potential positive schemes.

    “If you have a quarterback with 700+ rushing yards… we’re still looking at him as being in that conversation.” — Joey P. (10:20)

  • DBRO’s main concern: He doesn’t see top-2 upside anymore; ranks Lamar more realistically at QB5.

2. Tier 2: High-Upside, High-Risk & Bounce-Back Candidates

(18:29–29:08)

• Names: Joe Burrow, Jaden Daniels, Jalen Hurts, Justin Herbert, Jackson Dart, Caleb Williams
• Jalen Hurts (DBRO): Advocates for moving Hurts up, less concern over lost playmakers than with Jackson; sees 10–12 rushing TDs as likely and teases a possible 30-passing TD “ceiling season” (19:47–20:55).
• AJ Brown Debate: Consensus that Brown is still elite, and last year’s injuries skewed Hurts’/Eagles’ numbers (21:14–21:52).
• Justin Herbert (DBRO): Voicing concern—unsure about passing volume under new OC Mike McDaniel, and worries over OL recoveries. Herbert must rely on efficiency if the pass volume drops (22:59–24:23).
• Jackson Dart (Jake): Makes a case for a sophomore leap—cites last year’s 14th-overall finish as misleading (due to 2 counted early games when he took over). Points out weapon upgrades (M. Neighbors, I. Likely), new coaching, and “20-fantasy-points-per-game pace” when healthy. Injury risk is offset by QB replacement value in 1-QB leagues (24:23–29:08). > “If I lose Jackson Dart, go to the waiver wire… Dart-plus what you get is probably going to do better.” — Jake Seely (27:15)

3. Tier 3: Volume, Floor, and Veteran Debates

(32:15–44:26)

• Names: Trevor Lawrence, Dak Prescott, Brock Purdy, Patrick Mahomes, Matthew Stafford, Bo Nix
• Trevor Lawrence (Jake): Praises post-week-5 turnaround under new OC Liam Cohen—QB1 in fantasy points from that point on. Attributes improved play to system comfort and increased rushing (33:30–36:29). > “From week five on… only Josh Allen outscored him. We finally got the Trevor Lawrence we wanted.” — Jake Seely (34:40)
• Joey counters: Context of big games against weak defenses drove stats; expresses concern that 2025 may not repeat.
• Stafford vs Lawrence (Joey): Joey trusts Stafford’s elite passing and supporting cast despite age, asserts he’s a safer floor (36:29–41:10).
• DBRO’s Reply: Questions Stafford’s health, age, and the sustainability of his 7.7% TD rate (“sixth-highest in last 10 years”). Warns of regression and points to history of decline with age in QBs (41:10–43:02). Jake notes only Aaron Rodgers (’20/21) sustained 7%+ TD rate in back-to-back years.
• Dak, Mahomes, Brock Purdy, Bo Nix: Not deeply discussed; Mahomes’ health cautioned by Joey P., especially given Andy Reid’s vague injury updates (44:00–45:31).

4. Superflex Tier & Intriguing QB2s

(45:31–52:11)

• Names: Jared Goff, Kyler Murray, Jordan Love, Malik Willis, Baker Mayfield, C.J. Stroud, Sam Darnold, Bryce Young, Cam Ward, Tyler Shuck
• Baker Mayfield (Jake): Buy-low value due to low current ADP and McVay-style offense under new OC Zach Robinson. Even a floor outcome yields mid-QB2 results (47:02–48:59). > “He costs worse than his floor… if he just repeats last year, he’s still QB17–19.” — Jake Seely (47:13)
• Malik Willis (DBRO): Loves the upside—true rushing floor (averaged 44.8 rushing yards per start in 6 career starts), asserts he’s being drafted too low and has top-15 upside (50:02–50:38).
• Jake Seely: Admits Dolphins offense is tough to trust, but Willis’ “learning” and Slowik’s likely play calling create intriguing potential. Cites the risk/reward as worth it in this range.

5. Deep League & QB Dart Throws

(52:11–57:14)

• Names: Daniel Jones, Jacoby Brissett, Kirk Cousins, Deshaun Watson, Sh’dur Sanders, JJ McCarthy, Geno Smith, Michael Penix, Tua Tagovailoa, Ty Simpson
• Browns QB Battle (DBRO): Advocates for Sh’dur Sanders—if he wins the job, could break out with new weapons and a rebuilt OL. Impressive deep ball stats when clean (53:18–54:15).
• Daniel Jones Watch (Jake): Shocked by his low rank in consensus; reminds listeners Jones was QB8 in ppg before injury (“mid-teens ranking is warranted if healthy”) (54:56–57:14). > “I was the Daniel Jones hater… and now I’m the one supporting him because… until he got hurt, he was QB8 in fantasy points per game.” — Jake Seely (55:49)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “If you understand the quarterbacks, you understand the offenses. If you understand the offenses, there’s a good chance you’re going to be successful in your fantasy drafts.” — Joey P. (00:14)
• “Just following the process. Like, we have no proof of concept [the new Ravens OC] is actually good.” — DBRO (07:23)
• “Stop waiting for the shoe to drop. Embrace happiness, Joe!” — Jake Seely (37:52), playfully encouraging optimism on Trevor Lawrence.
• “Jackson Dart-plus the option of replacement off waivers: that’s better than most anyone else in this group.” — Jake Seely (27:15)
• “I love that you only went back to the season when [Stafford] only played nine games.” — DBRO (41:55), quipping in the Stafford vs. Lawrence debate.
• “He should at least be in the mid-teens. That’s all I’ve been trying to say.” — Jake Seely on Daniel Jones’ rank (57:14)

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Elite Tier Discussion: 03:04–14:52
• Hurts, Herbert, Dart, and Young Upside QBs: 18:29–29:08
• Veterans vs Up-and-Comers (Lawrence, Stafford, Purdy, Mahomes): 32:15–44:26
• Superflex/Value QB2s: 45:31–52:11
• Deep Sleepers/Third-QB Targets: 52:11–57:14

---

Closing Thoughts & Takeaways

• Rushing Remains King: Multiple analysts hammered home the value of mobile QBs (Lamar, Daniels, Dart, Willis, Jones).
• Injury/Regression Risk: Be mindful of high-variance profiles (Stafford, Lawrence, Mahomes’ health, Lamar Jackson’s sustainability).
• Replacement Value Is Key in 1-QB: Don't be afraid to draft high-risk, high-reward players like Dart knowing you can stream later if necessary.
• Veterans Not Washed Yet: Audio and stats suggest Stafford, Mayfield, and even Daniel Jones remain strong floor plays.
• Follow the Arguments: There’s a real split on bounce-back candidates and which veteran/young signal caller to bet on—making this a must-listen for players prepping draft strategy now.

---

For the complete rankings and the most up-to-date consensus, visit fantasypros.com/rankings.

---

This summary skips non-content sections (ads, intros, outros) and retains analyst tone, humor, and argument flow for a true-to-show experience.

Transcript

[Podcast Announcer]

This is an iHeart podcast.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Guaranteed Human liberty Mutual customizes your car and home insurance.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

And now we're customizing this rush hour

[Jake Seely]

ad to keep you calm, which could help your driving.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

And science says therapy is great for a healthy mindset.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

So enjoy this 14 second session on us. I think you've done everything right and absolutely nothing wrong. In fact, anything that hasn't gone your way could probably be blamed on your father not being emotionally available because his father wasn't emotionally available and so on. And now that you're calm and healing, you're probably driving better, too. Welcome in everybody to fantasy Pros. This is the fantasy football podcast. It is me, Joey P. Joe P. Zappia. And today we're going to take a look at the quarterback position. That's right. This is where it all begins for your fantasy knowledge. If you understand the quarterbacks, you understand the offenses. If you understand the offenses, there's a good chance you're going to be successful in your fantasy drafts and to start taking a deep dive into the early ranks of quarterback. Now that we have free agency out of the way, now that we have the NFL draft out of the way, now that Aaron Rodgers decides he wants to play football again, yay. We have Jake Seeley from the Athletic and we have Debro Derek Brown, the king of bros, here with us today to parse through all these rankings, which you can find by the way, over fantasypros.com rankings. Isn't that funny how you just put rankings at the end of it and it takes you right there? It's pretty good. So the consensus rankings are up here and. And we're going to start here with the very top tier of quarterback and jump in with two feet. Top tier. You have a question before we get started.

[Jake Seely]

I don't know.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

This moment.

[Jake Seely]

I don't know.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Right this time.

[Jake Seely]

I don't know.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Apologize to the audience who thought we were going to go right in, but now we're not. Go ahead.

[Jake Seely]

This is. No, never. Because I don't know if the producers are going to cut off like I wore my Mandalorian shirt. Are you wearing an AFC Richmond shirt?

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I am. I'm wearing not only. I realize not only am I wearing my AFC Richmond shirt today, but I've also got my Believe mug. So. Yeah, I guess that was.

[Jake Seely]

I just saw the RIC and half of H and I just wanted to make sure that I appreciate that. I know Nicole. I just got her for her birthday

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

a sweatshirt of that I love Ted Lasso. I. I'm not gonna lie I. I was late to Ted Lasso. I just watched it for the first time last year.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

I have. I have not seen it. I'll own it.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Producers keep all of this. I don't care about the jerk in the YouTube comments. It goes. Fast forward to 3 minutes and 45 seconds for the show to start. Nobody cares. This is the show. If you like it, cool.

[Jake Seely]

Work for us. If you want to jump at but. So you have to watch Project Hail Mary and he has to watch Ted Lasso.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

There you go. You really do.

[Jake Seely]

Now the rankings look.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

We've been going to see the Mandalorian though, by the way. Are you going to see it this weekend? I am.

[Jake Seely]

Absolutely. Nephew.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

It looks so good.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Dude, are you not?

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I don't know. My love for Star wars has really fallen off the last couple years.

[Jake Seely]

Joe went so far off the cliff. He hates it.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I am, I do. I'm just. I'm a purist.

[Jake Seely]

There's like kids on his lawn that wear Star wars stuff and he throws rocks.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Yeah, trash at him.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I throw my old Kenner figures at them for my Darth Vader case that I still have, which I still have in the closet, by the way. The figure case with Darth Vader and the whole thing. I don't know. We're gonna talk. We'll talk more about that.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Joey, don't do it.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Let's talk about the quarterbacks here. If you want this, check on Tailgate NFL. We had a great conversation there about all kinds of stupid things and football team. Check it out. YouTube right now. Anyway, let's talk about the top tier quarterbacks. Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Drake May. Feels right. Feels good. I've just been working on the quarterback profiles for BlackBook that'll be out on Amazon first week of June. I know DBRO is working diligently there as well, but I always do the quarterback write ups. And going through like this is kind of the top tier for me too. I can understand making cases for other guys also, but when you look at the consistency of Josh Allen the last couple years, it's clear. I mean, you know, he's quarterback one, quarterback two, quarterback one, quarterback two, quarterback 1, quarterback 1. I mean, at this point it's crazy. Like it's far and away the Lamar Jackson situation last year. My take on this is a very easy one, guys, which is he was never healthy the whole season. We have to just take it, throw it away and not lose sight of all the progress he made in 2024 where he threw 41 passing touchdowns and threw for 4,000 yards for the first time in his career. He made massive strides forward and last year it was just health and just deteriorate around the entire team. And then Drake May, we all thought that his rushing ability would kind of catapult him. We'll see. Obviously we're not at June 1st yet, but if the AJ Brown trade does happen and he goes there, that certainly helps keep him in this upper tier. So the easy question is this. Is there another guy that you want to throw into this or take out of this elite tier? Jake, I'm gonna start with you on this one. Is there somebody you want to put in or take out of this number one tier that we find on fp?

[Jake Seely]

I'm good with these three, but my tier includes Jaden Daniels and it seems. It's weird. I'm getting a lot of pushback on Jaden Daniels. I don't know why I said push back like that. Push back on.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

It was very Christopher Walken. Yeah. Why so far back for this take Jake.

[Jake Seely]

Very good Chris Walken impression. Yeah, that was really good. It was good.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

It was hurt last year so bad it hurt his legs.

[Jake Seely]

Whenever you're done when it comes to Daniels, look, we just had him here last year when we were drafting, coming off his rookie season where he was sixth in fantasy points per game in his rookie season. And there was a lot of complaint last year that Kliff Kingsbury didn't do anything but Cliff Kingsbury things and that's why the offense started having problems. Also on top of it, Terry McLaurin was his number one option. Also. He was hurt from the jump off and then hurt again and then hurt again. And I get it. The injury risk is going to be something that people want to push back on and I'm okay with that. But I mean, you're still talking about in his first four games, games which had that giant hurt gap in between, he did have seven touchdowns. He was averaging nearly 50 rushing yards per game. He didn't even get his rushing touchdowns until I think it was week seven, eight, nine. And if you look at it moving to David Blough, you're going to get more play action potentially. You're going to get oh what creativity to the Cliff Kingsbury offense because he's coming from that tree which is going to have some carryover, three wide, some motion and all that type of stuff. But we're actually going to use also what Jayden Daniels can do in the play action and some of the QB rollouts. So I think that you're going to get the best version of Jayden Daniels that we saw two years ago, which was already QB6 as a rookie. He finally has a second weapon. We hope. I know we're counting on a rookie, but we hope for a rookie to be a second weapon to improve the passing offense a little bit. I think what they're putting together around him isn't complete, but it's nice enough that I'm going to make the case that Jayna Daniels gets back to 21 plus fantasy points per game, which in my opinion deserves to be in tier one. Because if you can be a capable quarterback and you're running for 8,9000 yards, you're going to be in tier one. For me.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

No, look, I think that is absolutely. There's a, that's a fact. Like no one's going to dispute that at all. You know, when you're out there for that many yards, he's going to end up with that grouping. I'm trying to remember what he was at in 2024. I'm going to pull that up real quick there for Jaden Daniels in terms of his fantasy points per game.

[Jake Seely]

That's what I was talking about.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Yeah, it was 21 and a half. Right. Okay. He was. Yeah. Well, I'm looking at this right now and that is not a hard leap of faith to take. It's funny. That would have been good enough for second overall last year, Jake, by the way, just the way things kind of turned out.

[Jake Seely]

Thank you for that.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

You're welcome. This is why we like to look at the numbers here. Now, dbro, there's a guy that you again, you want to adjust here. Now, I don't know if you want to adjust him out of this tier or just want to adjust him down a tick, but I want to hear about this because I think this is a little controversial and you're not the first. You know, we know DBRO is not afraid of controversy here on the program, so go ahead.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Just following the process.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Man, you're like the Madonna of fantasy prose. You just, just please don't release any books.

[Jake Seely]

If he's going with the first answer, I'm cool with it because I also have him number three. But if he's going with the second answer and kicking him out, I'm really interested.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Yeah, I've actually, like, I don't have him in this tier. I'd have him. I have lamar Jackson, a QB5. I'm not saying that Lamar Jackson is dust. He is forever nothing. I, I, I just have more questions about Lamar Jackson than it seems like a lot of people do. Like everybody's like, oh, he was hurt and we're just going to excuse everything away. And are we all not also realizing that he's entering his age 29 season, he has almost 1100 rushing attempts in his career. The injuries have been an issue and if the rushing doesn't keep up, they added a lot of weapons. We have a new oc. We don't even know if that OC is going to be good. We think he's going to be good because he worked with Ben Johnson. What if he sucks? He's never called plays in the NFL. Like, we have no proof of concept that he's actually good. And then you go back to like how Lamar Jackson finished last year. It was a long sample size of terrible guys, like weeks nine through 18. It wasn't just, oh, he's a low end QB1. Lamar Jackson was QB20 in fantasy points per game.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Right? But I think he was. But we talked about a myriad of injuries that he had during that span. Like it was, it was not just like one injury, it was like several, all lower half injuries too. And then I just feel like that was a guy going, hey, I'm going to do my best to get on the field because my team is dying a slow death out here. We're trying to propel into the playoffs and I get that. And Harbaugh, the pressure of the expectations. This was the team that was supposed to go to the super bowl last year. So you're not wrong about, you know, his bad play. He was bad, there's no doubt about that. But when do you sort of take that with a giant grain of salt and say he was playing through a time where he probably should not have been playing? And we can't take that necessarily as a copy and paste of 2026.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

I, I'm, I'm not taking it as a copy and paste, but what I'm saying is like people are saying okay with all the injuries and stuff. And yes, I think that has merit of saying, oh, he's going to rush more, but he was God awful as a passer. That's the caveat when nobody's talking about it wasn't just that he's not running, oh, he's hurt, he's banged up. He was terrible as a passer. Like amongst 35 qualifying quarterbacks over that time, he was 33rd in accurate throw rate. Only Brady Cook was worse. He was 26th and catchable target rate. He was 31st in hero throw rate. So if I'm saying the rushing bounces back I haven't had freaking QB5 so I'm not saying that the rushing doesn't probably bounce back but there is some risk here Considering the age of Lamar Jackson Mark Andrews is sure I think that's fair. The other weapons around him the OC change the offensive line is also littered with questions so like I just don't think we can gloss over all of the the risks that I think with Lamar Jackson and taking him as high in any draft versus other quarterbacks around him.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I Jake I know you're going to push back on this so I want you to but I want to set you up in a way because I want to throw this I want to throw the meat at you so you can go ahead and chew on a little bit. He has never rushed for fewer than 695 yards. That was his rookie season. Every year has basically been 700 all the way up to 1200. I look yeah and the rushing will come back but to Jake's point earlier about Jaden Daniels if you have a quarterback that's going to be in that 700 plus rushing total no matter what happens passer wise we're still looking at him as being in that conversation And I'm not saying Jake that we should be chasing 2024 that that might be the high watermark of his career MVP caliber season. I might not probably will be but at the same time if we get that rushing total back up into the seven hundreds it's going to be really hard to keep Lamar out of this

[Jake Seely]

tier one so that's the biggest thing is if you look at the chorus of running back or quarterbacks running backs that have run for 7 to 800 yards at quarterback and then you don't even need their passing stat line the 707 I always bring up a Daniel Jones the one year he threw more interceptions than touchdowns he was still a top 10 quarterback. That's going to get you so far. So last year is probably the high bar of his passing career. We're never going to get back to his second season. It's probably the high bar of the rushing when he ran for his 1207 but I think the biggest thing is I'm not kicking him out because given enough of what we've seen of his career which his low end I mean we're talking about as 4 is 20 fantasy points per game. I like that feels like worst case scenario I do I will sit here and say I feel like Last year was anomalous. I'm with you on the fact that there was a lot going on from him and everything. You're welcome. But the bigger thing I'm going to say is I'll try to spin it positively. And let's say that at the same time, I'm not saying Derek's not wrong for anything. He's taking.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Oh, I don't think he's wrong either.

[Jake Seely]

We're hoping that Declan Doyle can make moves. But I will say here is the one positive that I did look out. So I brought up the play action before with Jamie Daniels when I was going into that dive. For the last two seasons, there's only one team that has played play action more than the Lions, where Declan Doyle is coming from, and that was the Rams. The Ravens, bottom third of the league. Here's the kicker on the side of it, Lamar Jackson, number one in the league. And touchdowns or first downs per attempt under play action. So there's your positive that Declan Doyle can bring some of that system and like you said, Debro, maybe he's a terrible play caller like Kingsbury at some point, or maybe it only works for half the season and then everybody's like, oh, we see what you're doing. But there is some positive takeaway that the fact that the play action, especially when you talk about Lamar Jackson, Derrick Henry and more play action, a little less of the RPO style of the play action, that maybe this gets the. The passing Lamar back that we want to see.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I want to see that transition, Jake, to your point, like getting away from the RPO version of it a little bit, because I think, you know, look, as long as you've got Derrick Henry still on this team and last year he still rushed for what, 1500 yards, like that is still something that you just cannot stop, you know, selling out on. You've got to be ready for the Derrick Henry run at all times, like you just have to in this offense. And I think that will play back into, at the very least maybe in the beginning of the year, building that Lamar Jackson conference back up. Make it simple, make it quick, you know, just get the good rhythm there. I think the Ravens are one of those teams de ro for me that they got us. I want to see them start off hot because I think it will say a lot about. Maybe it was just time where everything could be. The old voices of Harbaugh, all the stuff going on, the pressure of the Ravens, maybe just a clean slate is exactly what this veteran team kind of needed.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Yeah, my Only last pushback about Lamar Jackson is we, we kind of. Jake kind of illuminated it was if we don't think that he's going to get back to 2024 when he was QB1 and fantasy points per game. And we don't think he's going to get back to 2019 when he was QB1 and fantasy points per game. My only pushback about this is I don't think he should be at QB2 because we're basically saying he's got a really damn good chance to be QB1 overall. And I just, I think there's more risk and I don't think he gets back to being QB1 overall. So I don't want to put him at QB2 in my rankings when outside of those years. So in 2023 through 2020, it was QB3, QB6, QB7, QB8 and fantasy points per game. So he's much closer over the totality of his career outside of those two years of QB5 than QB2 or QB1.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Those are also years without Derrick Henry. Just for putting that out there. Derrick Henry changes the complexion.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

What kind of running backs they got behind him?

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Nothing. Nothing exactly. Nothing at all. But that is, that is a big difference in what, you know, again, the adjustments you have to make as a defense. So wait, where do you have Lamar? Just out of curiosity, again, he's number one, QB5, who's number two for you? Who's your 1, 2, 3?

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

So my number two, since we're talking about guys that could bounce back and things like that, my QB2 is. Jalen hurts.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Jalen Hurt. Okay. All right. That'll be interesting for later in the show. We're gonna get to that in just a second. Before we do, shout out to the sponsor of our show, Hard Rock Bet. The NBA playoffs is in the third round, if you can believe it already. And series are heating up. Who's gonna win the title? Well, we don't know yet. But I do know you can get in on all the action on the hardwood right now with the NBA action at Hard Rock Bet Florida Sportsbook and the official sports betting partner of the Orlando Magic. Don't forget that. So whether it's tip off right now, all the way to the buzzer beaters at the end, you can get involved even same game parlay action and also live game betting over there. And for new users, guess what you could do? Bet 5 bucks, get 150 in bonus bets when you place your first bet and you win plus your winnings. And also you could Double your winnings on your first 10 bets. Max of $50. That's right, double your winnings on your first 10 bets. So if you want 100 bucks now, make it 200. See, that's how doubling works. Simple math. So the welcome offer is good for you. New promos Daily Open up the app right now. Download it. Hard Rock Bet App get the party started, baby. With Hard Rock Bet payable and bonus bets. Not a cash offer Offered by the Seminole Tribe of Florida in Florida Offered by the Seminole Hard Rock Digital LLC and other states Must be plus in physically present in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee or Virginia. Play terms and conditions apply. Concerned about gambling in Florida? Call 1-833-play- wise in Indiana. If you or someone you know has a gambling Problem wants help, call 1-809 with it gambling problem, call 1-800- gambler in Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia Warning.

[Jake Seely]

This product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Hey, it's the Velo guy.

[Jake Seely]

If Henry Ford popped out for a smoke, horsepower wouldn't be your flex, it'd be your ride. Because no one made history by popping out, they stayed for more. Get more wherever, whenever Enjoyment with Velo Nicotine Pouches discover [e-mail] underage sale prohibited nicotine Pouches Velo is a synthetic nicotine product website restricted to age 21 nicotine consumers. Copyright 2026 MBI Are you looking for

[Podcast Announcer]

support in your weight management journey? Zepbound Tirzepatide may be able to help. Zepbound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity to help adults with obesity or some adults with overweight who also have weight related medical problems to lose excess body weight and keep the weight off. Zepbound is Approved as a 2.5, 5, 7.5, 10, 12.5 or 15mg injection. Zepbound contains Tirzepatide and should not be used with other Tirzepatide containing products or any GLP1 receptor agonist medicines. It is not known if Zepbound is safe and effective for use in children. Don't share needles or pens or reuse needles. Don't take if allergic to it or if you or someone in your family had medullary thyroid cancer or if you've had multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2. Tell your doctor if you get a lump or swelling in your neck. Stop Zepbound and call your doctor if you have severe stomach pain or a serious Allergic reaction. Severe side effects may include inflamed pancreas or gallbladder problems. Tell your doctor if you experience vision changes before scheduled procedures with anesthesia. If you're nursing pregnant, plan to be or taking birth control pills. Taking Zephone with a sulfonylurea or insulin may cause low blood sugar. Side effects include nausea, diarrhea and vomiting, which can cause dehydration and worsen kidney problems. Talk to your doctor, call 1-800-545-5979 or visit zepbound.lilly.com all right, let's get to

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

the next piece of action here. It's tier two, Joe Burrow at the top on fantasy pros consensus at number four. Then Jaden Daniels, Mr. Sealy's favorite to move up a tier, at number five, Jalen Hurts at number six, Justin Herbert at seven, which I like because Justin Herbert was a true warrior last year playing with all those tackles missing. He got. He got sucked. 50. Was it 54 times or 58 times? I lost track. I couldn't even keep track of how many times that young man got sacked yesterday. 54. So last year, excuse me, not yesterday. That would have been a lot. Feels like just yesterday. Jackson Dart at number eight and Caleb Williams at number nine. So a pretty good grouping here with this grouping. Debro, I'm gonna start with you because you've got. I know Jalen hurts. You want to, like, give a couple moments on him, but you're talking about some guys with some rushing upside with Dart. Caleb Williams, obviously, Jaden Daniels. We're talking about Joe Burrow, who obviously we know he's MVP caliber. The only problem with Joe Burrow is his one comeback player of the year twice, and he hasn't barely turned 30. And then you've got guys in this grouping like Justin Herbert who've already shown you some big time upside and now he's got a big offensive coordinator coming in here with Mike McDaniel who we have very high expectations for. So Dbro, walk me through your J1 Herz take and then maybe a guy that you want to move down a little bit because I feel like you're the Debbie Downer on the show today. Yeah.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

So I want to bump Jalen Hurts up because if we're talking about bounce back and we're talking about all these different things about what could go right for a quarterback, then I feel like Jalen Hurts needs to be in that conversation. And I'm more willing to bet on Jalen Hurts than Lamar Jackson at this point because again, Jake has talked about this in previous shows. The Jalen Hurts narrative is kind of funny, man. It's like, oh, just because he doesn't throw over the middle of the field doesn't mean that he can't. He's had God awful OCS over the last two years. Like Kevin Petullo, horrible. Brian Johnson, horrible. He hasn't had a good one since Shane Stocking. So if Sean Manion comes in, and I know there's just as much risk with him versus Declan Doyle, but it's not baked into the price of Jalen Hurts. And we've seen Jalen hurts. It's not just, oh, the rushing yardage. Rushing yardage. It's the touchdowns. And everybody's like, oh, well, what if he doesn't get back to 13 or 14 rushing touchdowns? Okay, well, if he spikes 10 to 12, I mean, he was at freaking eight last year. The other thing we've never gotten out of Jalen Hurts. Never. We have never gotten a 30 passing touchdown season out of Jalen Hurts. What if that's this year, guys? We've seen jalen hurts be QB1 and fantasy points per game.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Hard to imagine that with the way the structure of the roster is based on how heavy I think they added on playmakers.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

That's hard.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

No, no. Because they're probably losing their best one in AJ Brown, who for whatever reason

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

right now at this point of his career, I'm gonna.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I'm gonna say yes. I don't know what Jake says. Jake, do you say yes.

[Jake Seely]

Is.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Is AJ Brown still elite for you? I think he is.

[Jake Seely]

I would still take him over Devontae Smith or anything they have. And that's coming from somebody who's argued for Lemon. I mean, we're talking about.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I like Lemon.

[Jake Seely]

He's only about to turn 29. So, like, I'm not putting AJ Brown out the pasture yet. I think the argument that Debro should have made is that A.J. brown and Dallas Goddard were not healthy for half the season combined. Like, if you like, they missed a lot. So, like, Devontae Smith was the only one out there the entire time. He even got banged up a few times. So, like, he was dealing with a lot of injuries, including the offensive line line. So there you go. There's a little bit more nuggets for your. Even though I thought I was the high person on Jalen Hurts, clearly I'm not.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Not enough. Not where Derrick Brown wants to live in that rarefied era. Jalen hurts. So dbro, obviously, you know, hurts a couple more rushing Touchdowns, some better health and maybe a little bit of an injection of youth with guys like Makai Lemon, who I think the three of us are all very high on and I'm sure we're going to ruin his adp. I'm sorry in advance, everybody. I apologize. We do our best here.

[Jake Seely]

Discount anymore.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Yeah, forget that discount. Do some early drafting if you want the discount. But I know that you also have concerns about Justin Herbert, which I'm curious about to the. Why? Because to me I thought this was like one of the great performances of last year. Just all around playing hurt, playing with offensive line that fell apart, playing without a consistent running game because of all the injuries they had there, playing with a wide receiver core of old farts and guys who really just weren't consistent week to week. And now, you know, you brought in some better talent. You, you've got a healthy Omarion Hampton, you got an OC here. Like to me, I feel like the yards after carry that Hampton can help Pat his stats with is really nice. The two tackles being back and healthy really change what you might be able to do here. But why do you see Herbert maybe on the negative side?

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Well, so for me with Herbert it's not so much.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

It's.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

It's negative. It's. I don't know what kind of passing volume we get out of this offense with my. Which version of Mike McDaniel do we get? Do we get the last two years and he was 25th and 26th and running an offense that was 25th and 26th, the neutral passing rate? Or do we get the two previous years in Miami where he was 8th and 11th and how much of Harbaugh wanting to protect Herbert, how much of this is what they want to be as an offense and as a team? I, I don't know guys. And if the passing volume is more towards the lower end of the league and not top 12 then that's where it's it. It gets dicey for me with Herbert and putting him as a top of locked in top 10 quarterback when in two of his last four seasons he's been outside the top 12 quarterbacks and fantasy points per game. Last year he had a career high with 31 rushing yards per game. Although you be kind of rewind every season before that he never eclipsed more than 18. So we also got like the confluence of a lot of good things from Greg Roman at the beginning of the season in a pass happy offense. Justin Herbert was running more. He's never run that that much in his career. To this point, does the rushing keep up and how much passing volume do we get? Because if we don't get a ton of passing volume and he's going to have to be crazy efficient. And that's not even talking about. Yes, I think Joe all coming back is really, really good. The history of guys coming back from patellar tendon injuries for Rashawn Slater is God awful. So I don't even know what we see out of Slater this year.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

That's fair. That's fair. Well, the hope is for the best there. Jake. I want to talk to you about Jackson Dart. A guy last year that did get to take the reins earlier than, you know, maybe expected, but not as early as maybe Derrick Brown and I wanted. But Jackson Dart last year finished with 17.6 fantasy points per game. That was good enough for 14th overall. And when you're starting to look at Jackson Dart this year and projecting what's going to happen, it is still kind of tricky because you have a scenario where Malik Neighbors didn't have that cleanup surgery. Varying reports will tell you different things. Some people will tell you, oh, that's good, that means everything's going to be really much better. When he starts to, you know, fully ramp up. Other people tell you, well, it's just going to delay the timeline. You've got Cam Scatter Boo coming back from an injury. You've got new head coach, new system, new all things happening around, around him and some new weapons like Isaiah Likely and Malachi Fields and all the other guys we could talk about. So Jackson Dart, obviously another Russian quarterback. We love that from fantasy. At the same time, what does it look like for him in terms of his development? Year two, are we gonna see another sophomore slump? Is he's too much of an injury risk for you? Or are you willing to bet that Jackson Dart can do enough here to crack the fantasy points per game of the top 12 guys here? Because clearly the consensus believes that.

[Jake Seely]

Well, we're also talking about a new offense too. And real quick to go to Herbert. I'm also the efficiency. So they've been the fourth lowest pace the Chargers were the last two seasons. So he has to be efficient. Not that he can't be, but he has to be efficient. There's a little bit difference here when it comes to Jackson. That's why actually I agree a little bit. Justin Herbert I still have in this tier, but just a little bit lower. Jackson Dart I think should be a little bit higher. Because if you look at last year and what he did and I've already seen people on another show that we've done and people are like, oh no, Malik Neighbors, I can't believe you think Jackson Dart. Do you know how many games he played with Malik Neighbors last year?

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

A big fat one, I was going to say. Do you know what Malik Neighbor did in that game?

[Jake Seely]

No, Malik Neighbors didn't even do much in that game. Like I think what he had three or four targets. So like it wasn't even like he played with. He played with Darius Slayton, Wanda Robinson, who all like injuries there, Theo Johnson and a bunch of jokers out there. The entire season, everybody's like, oh, it's going to be so terrible. Even if Malik Neighbors isn't ready till October, he's already right now he has a better collection of weapons than he did last year. And everybody also wants to poo poo all over the situation with Matt nagging Greg Grom. That's the part that I think people are also missing with Matt Nagy and Greg Roman. This is not just Matt Nagy. They brought in both because you know what Harbaugh did? He said, hey guess what? Maggie's great. Maggie's great at the passing game, sucks at running. Greg Roman great in the run game, sucks at passing. Let's bring him in and ask him to do one thing each and leave the other thing that they suck at alone. And now you're going to get the best of both worlds. And I know it's a lot of projecting we have.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

How does it work?

[Jake Seely]

You let Maggie design. He's still going to be a play caller but you let him design the passing game side. Like Roman's bringing his Roman style rushing off as he designs that side of the offense. Nag is still the play caller but I'm pretty sure that Harbaugh with his clout is brought him in. If they can't work together, he would have never brought them in together. Like you don't bring in Roman. Roman at this point of his career is not being like, oh yeah, I'm going to be third in line unless he's willing like he understands the connection that's going to be made here. So I think you're looking at basically let's take the what people might not know about both. You're kind of looking at an Andy Reid ish kind of west coast offense ish which spread RPO heavy some two tight end sets, shifts zone. Like they're going to do everything they can to maximize Jackson Dart and the weapons around him. But the biggest part we haven't even talked about here. It's the rushing. Like, we're going to get what we just talked about with these other quarterbacks. 7, 800 yards. He's going to call Josh Allen. He's going to call his own number. We just saw it last year. He's like, hey, I'm going to get hurt three times. I don't care. I'm going to keep doing it. Like, at some point I know people are going to be like, well, that's my argument against him and that's fine. You don't have to take him. He is an injury risk. Cam Scatterboo, if he's ready, week one is an injury risk because he sees a brick wall and runs into that instead of the open lane. So that's the biggest problem here is that with Jackson dart, he might get hurt, but that style is what we want in fantasy. And that's the biggest part that you talk about a lot of times, Joe, in the playbook and similar to drafting is that if I lose Jackson Darth go to the waiver wire and find somebody else. But the fact of what I get Jackson dart plus that option is going to be better than most anybody in this group. And I understand part of it is saying like, okay, well, I'm going to lose Jackson dart. But if you're looking at this group, it's the replacement of the person with the Jackson dart combined that I'm going to get a better season from than somebody like in this range that like, oh, Brock Purdy plays a full 17 games. Like, yeah, okay, cool. But Jack Start plus is probably going to do better.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Did you just call the black book the playbook after writing for it for almost four years, Jake Sealer today I'm hurting. Yeah, you know what?

[Jake Seely]

It's your playbook in the black book.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

All right, fair enough. You know what? Here's my take. With Jackson dark in single quarterback leagues, I love the risk. I'll take it because it's so easy for replacement value. Right. You could go later and get Jordan Love and get Jared Goff. If you want to get a second quarterback, get somebody else who's a little bit more vanilla and you have that guy in case dart doesn't kind of rein in the style. Dart style is fine. He's just got to avoid contact a little better. That's all. Like, the aggressiveness to run is not the problem. The knowledge of when to realize, you know, you don't need that extra. But it's also just like, okay, the gain the first down that's what matters. Moving the chains is what matters. You trying to be a hero all the time, that's where you get yourself into danger in the NFL, maybe not so much in college. And again, that's a transition. So I'm hoping there's a learning curve there. Yes.

[Jake Seely]

I forgot my biggest point. You said his points per game, it's skewed because he keeps getting counted for those first two games.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

I was going to bring this up too.

[Jake Seely]

Yeah, he actually averaged 19.97. Let's just call it 20 because you round up. He averaged 20 fantasy points per game, which included that basically zero against the Vikings.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

So good enough for seventh overall. And right now his ranking is the the eighth quarterback right now. So that's kind of right in line

[Jake Seely]

depending on the site you play for. That was good for fourth overall to be.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Well, I don't know what side you're paying on.

[Jake Seely]

I'm just letting people know.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

All right, let's get to the third tier of Code Rex. And remember too, if you got drafts coming up, especially the rookie drafts, let us help you with all those. Go to fantasypros.com simulator and use the Dynasty Draft simulator so you can crush all the mocks in just minutes when you get ready for any of your startup Dynasty leagues or your rookie drafts. And if you are MVP or Hall of Fame subscriber here, you can even test trade scenarios you can mock with the actual traded draft picks. It's great. And we've got a three day free trial going on right now with the Premium subscription@ fantasypros.com Dynasty26 Again, free three days. Do it three days before your draft to get ready for it. Fantasypros.com Dynasty26 Use it for all it's worth. And then when you realize how great it is, just, you know, re up and then use it for the rest of the season for all your other leagues. That's a smart thing to do. Don't be a tool. Use the tools at Fantasy pros. All right, let's go to the third tier of quarterbacks here and this one's going to be really interesting. Trevor Lawrence at 10. They have Dak Prescott at 11. Goodyear, bad year. Dak Prescott. That is the dumbest thing ever. If you're drafting off Goodyear, bad year, you're a moron. Don't do that if you're avoiding him because, well, last year was the good year. Now I gotta get out. It is the dumbest, most nonsensical thing ever and I just want to dispel that and I. And you know it's bad because DBRO is just shaking his head yes at me. So you know, it's definitely true. Brock Purdy at 12. I. I got some questions about that one. Patrick Mahomes at 13, the MVP of the league. Matthew Stafford at 14, coming off a season where he was first in everything, which I think is really interesting that he's all the way at 14. And then Bo Nix at 15, who also, it ain't pretty all the time with Bo Nicks. And maybe it doesn't materialize all that much in the first half of games, but by golly, by the end of the game, somehow those fantasy points are there every single week.

[Jake Seely]

That's right.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

By golly. That's all the Ted Lasso stuff that you know this morning for me. G Wiz, G Wiz. And by golly. All right, so Jake, let's start with Trevor Lawrence here because here's my thing with Trevor Lawrence. It took a little while. I want to give him a grace period. New offense, Liam Co, new coach, all that stuff. Most of the damage came towards the end of the year for Trevor Lawrence. It was a really good run at the end of the year. It was also a lot of the stats got petted by that. He won huge game against the jets and it was massive. It was also the only 300 yard game he had all year. So it's not exactly prolific passing attempt attack rather. And now you're going to take Travis Hn out of that offense and replace him with Chris Rodriguez and BAE Shoten and we don't know how that runs. I have legitimate concerns about Trevor Lawrence. I think everybody was just waiting so long for a big breakout kind of season and then we kind of got it, most of it in the second half. But I think there's other quarterbacks. I mean, if you're asking me, I'd rather go into fantasy next year with Matthew Stafford for all of his back issues than a single quarterback league. Sorry, that's still the Rams, last time I checked. They still got Puka Nakua, they still got devonte Adams. This is a guy coming off an MVP season. He looked pretty good to me last year. Jake, why? What's your take on Trevor Lawrence? Because again, this is another one that really confuses me.

[Jake Seely]

I'll give you a couple ones again here, quarterbacks. And I'm going all the way Back to Week 5, not the end of the season, because you're right, that's what the easy approach everybody takes with Trevor Lawrence is like, oh, Blah, blah. You had a 40 and 30 point game in there. So of course, when you have over 70, almost 80 points in two games, you're going to rank number one in a lot of things. Let's go back to Week 5 because the bigger thing I talked about years ago with the people, remember Eli Manning when they made their offensive coordinator change and they said for somebody that's been playing the league that long, it takes four, six, maybe even eight weeks when you have that massive of overhaul in your offense for the quarterback to get comfortable and start hitting it the way that they want to see it. It took them four weeks because from week five on, more quarterbacks and fantasy points. One more points per game because there's buys in there. One more rushing touchdowns, one more rushing everything. It's Josh Allen, by the way. For all of those over Trevor Lawrence, he was number two. And that's why I want to argue that Trevor Lawrence doesn't necessarily need to be too much higher. But I put him in the tier above this because it took for all this time that everybody wanted to see Trevor Lawrence. Trevor Lawrence, Trevor Lawrence. Are you a generational talent? What happened to you? We're ready to write off his career. Liam Cohen, Liam Cohen, I don't know. Liam Cohen comes in, installs his offense

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

back again into the voice.

[Jake Seely]

I know I've been practicing, practicing.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I can't do his very setting to me.

[Jake Seely]

And the listener, when it comes down to we finally got what Trevor Lawrence can do in the NFL. And it's also why I brought up the rushing touchdowns, is because time and again what I was saying about Trevor Lawrence and when I say what I was saying, that's not the victory lap. I've been wrong on people before, but it's true about all quarterbacks. And this is why I want to break it out for everybody out there, ones that can run. And I don't even mean like just 50 yards over a season. I mean like 3, 4, 500 yards. Like Baker Mayfield's best season of the two past season, the best year to his career. Bryce Young, when he started playing somewhat well, Jacksonville, these quarterbacks. And if you watch Trevor Lawrence at Clemson when he ran, it was because he was comfortable, because he was seeing the field and he said, you know what? It's not there. I'm taking off. He started doing that with Jacksonville last year because he was comfortable, because he was also hitting Parker Washington later in the season. Jacoby Myers, Brian Thomas, as much as we bemoan him on this show time and time and time Again of what happened to him after all the collection of talent there because it's Trevor Lawrence going back to Clemson. It's not just the running. It's also getting those first and second reads out, hitting them quickly, getting them open and getting that yards after the catch. And we saw the Trevor Lawrence we had been waiting for since he was drafted. The generational talent that never fulfilled and now nobody really wants him. And like that's why I'm okay with him because I have him in that tier just above this at the end of it to be clear. But I'm willing to wait on quarterback even all the guys that we've talked about so far because it seems like, and I'm not saying I'm right, you're wrong Joe. It's just. It seems like a lot of people have your opinion too is like I don't know if he can do it again. There's a lot of questions there. So I'll be happy to take him in the mid rounds as somebody who by the way over the entire season finished this top five quarterback and we finally got the Trevor Lawrence we wanted.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

We did again. When you have a game, excuse me, where you have for, you know, 330 yards and five touchdowns in one game towards the end you have a couple of three touchdown performances. Was three of them actually on top of that from week 12 on it against some lesser opponents too. Let's be honest. Arizona Cardinals. You're pounding away on the Tennessee titans in week 18. You know, like there are some games there where you know and the opponents. I, I do think the context matters. By the way, speaking of context, you are correct. Jake Seeley. Trevor Lawrence was QB1 from week five in fantasy points per game all the way to the end of the season. Do you know who was number two? You want to guess? Matthew Stafford. 21.9. My argument, well here, which is the MVP guy, the old fart Stafford. Well, do you want to fight your battle for you. You want him to choose your champion of Matthew Stafford?

[Jake Seely]

Let's, let's throw out, let's just throw out the 44 point game. Let's just. It never happened. He scored zero that week. He's still QB7 and fantasy points per game.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Fair. I'm not trying to say that Trevor Lawrence now I'm Derek Brown on this show. I'm not saying Trevor Lawrence can't be good. I'm saying I have concerns about that second year. You know, sometimes you get that everything's new, everything's clicking, you're feeling good about things and they kind of didn't have the expectations. I think exhibitions were low because it was a transition year and they outperform their expectations.

[Jake Seely]

Stop waiting for the shoe to drop. Embrace happiness, Joe.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I want to embrace the Jaguars.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

He can't. He's a Liam Cohen hater and I think has.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

You know what? I. I did say as a head coach, I had massive concerns about him as a head coach. I know, I remember and I just want to see it. I also said the same thing about Mike McDaniel as a head coach and everyone thought I was nuts. Right. I say he's a great offensive mind. Head coach. I don't know. I think it's going to flame out. I think it's going to burn bright and flame out. I kind of feel like it burned bright and flamed out. Now he's back in his wheelhouse. All right, dbro, there's your chance. I have been waiting there with the bat to take a swing at me on Matthew Stafford, so go ahead.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

So the back issues are just not a worry for you, Joe?

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Of course they are. But I mean, who could agree years old with a back issue coming off of here where he led the league in passing and led the league in passing yards and led the league of passing touchdowns and he plays for Sean McVeigh and if he doesn't play a freaking snap in the preseason again, I ain't worried about it now.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Okay, so we're not worried about the back issues. We're also not worried about. Hold on. We're not worried about Puka Dakua's off field stuff or his. We're not worried about Devonte Adams injury issues and being another.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

But can't we do this for every team? Can't we do that for the Jaguars too? Can't we look and say, are we not worried that Brian Thomas is a non Persona guy in this that we don't know. So you're not worried that you're taking Travis Etienne out of this offense. Excuse me, Hn out of this offense, who was so important to this offense

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

running last year recklessly inefficient on the ground that Travis etien? Well, that's the same.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

You call him inefficient all you want. He had 300 plus yards after after catch on last season's totals and that

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

was one of the top 10, every single tackle breaking metric. I care about you and I'm telling you Travis ETN was one of the most inefficient running backs in the NFL. No, I'm not worried about him at all.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Okay.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

But getting back to Stafford, this offense is top heavy, incredibly top heavy. You're so worried about Brock purdy and the 49ers staying healthy. But we're not worried about the Rams staying healthy. We're not worried about Stafford staying healthy. We're not worried about a quarterback that, if you want to.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

There's a difference. Can I tell you what the difference is? Can I tell you what the difference. Well, I want to address each one because you're throwing the.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

I haven't even gotten to the statistical things outside of that, but go ahead.

[Jake Seely]

Sure.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

All right, well, here. Here you go. I want. I want to talk about this one because, yes, I'm worried equally about the 49ers. And the difference is one of those two quarterbacks is headed for the hall of Fame. And if you give that quarterback still that same system with whatever he will

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

find when he's almost 40, we're talking about age.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Matthew Stafford is one of the great quarterbacks this league has seen, and it's unfortunate that he played most of his career in Detroit where people just didn't understand that. But to compare him to Brock Purdy, the ultimate system quarterback who, again, I'm not taking shots. He's done a good job in that role in that offense. But when you can throw Mac Jones into that offense and it looks just as efficient. Color me unimpressed about Brock Purdy. So the difference is Brock Purdy, also a guy that's had some injuries last year, who played more games last year, by the way, Brock Purdy or Matthew Stafford?

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Just out of curiosity, my conversation here is not pro Brock Purdy. It's that you're dismissing the injury and the risks around one player while talking about it with another player. They're basically the same kind of thing. I'm not saying they're equivalent as far as talent. The hall of Fame doesn't even freaking matter to me. And outside of Stafford, So last year he was QB4 and fantasy points per game. By the way, I was in on Stafford last year.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

So was I.

[Jake Seely]

Prior.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Prior to that.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

QB 26, QB 14, QB 28, QB 11, QB 21. So we want to pay for the MVP season. We're not going to worry about that. We're not going to worry also about the fact of last year, Joe, he set a career high in passing touchdown rate with an insane 7.7%. His previous high was his first year with the Rams of 6.8%. Like all of these things scream, Matthew Stafford can be Very good and still lead the Rams to the promised land if he could stay healthy. But maybe it's not MB caliber and maybe it's not top five and maybe it's not QB one status. That doesn't mean that he can't be good in NFL talk and putting wins and all that kind of stuff.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I love that you only went back to the season where in 2022 he only played nine games.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

I went back all the way to 2020, bro.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Well, in 2021, it was QV5 where he threw for 4, 800 yards and 41 touchdowns. So let's not. I mean, when. When Trevor Lawrence starts sniffing 40 touchdown seasons, call me, call me, let me know how that goes.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

And outside of that year, 24, 26.

[Jake Seely]

So we're for you. For you. Dbro.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I like this kind of show.

[Jake Seely]

The 7.7% touchdown to attempt percentage.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Insane.

[Jake Seely]

It's. Well, hold on. I'll give you some more for it. It's the sixth highest in the past 10 years. And of anybody who's actually reached just 7%, there's only been one quarterback who's gone over 7% the following season. One. That entire time? Nope. You want to go on Guess Joe? Russ came close. Russ came close, actually.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

So he's always matching team metric. Kind of a quarterback. Is that what we're looking at here?

[Jake Seely]

I'll give you a giant hint. We weren't even talking about him until yesterday.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Oh, Aaron Rodgers.

[Jake Seely]

Aaron Rodgers in 2020 and 2021.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Yeah. Another one.

[Jake Seely]

9.1 and then 7%.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Yeah. Another old fart who knows how to play the quarter.

[Jake Seely]

But even he. He dropped from 9.1 to 7 the year after.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

And look, I'm not trying to argue that Matthew Stafford is a top five quarterback or even a top 10 quarterback. What I'm trying to argue is the point of this notion that Trevor Lawrence has. Has turned a corner forever and that now everything is just sunshine and roses again. Go look at the context of the opponents. The games against the Cardinals, the games against the jets, and the games against the Tennessee Titans in that span after week 12 had a huge matter upon all of those stats and that big average jumping up. And if you want to pretend like that's not important, all those teams that quit, all the teams that really weren't playing for anything. I mean, come on, like, let's. Let's not be super impressed that everything's turned fantastic for Lawrence going forward. I hope it does.

[Jake Seely]

In Denver, the wild card game against Buffalo, like, just like the numbers were still there.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Look, I will, I will continue to say that if you press me next year for a qb, you know who's going to finish higher there, Matthew Stafford or Trevor Lawrence? I'll still put Matt, I think here,

[Jake Seely]

I'll tell you my simplest version of it. It's like I'm not super. Like it has to be Lawrence or hey, it has to be Stafford. I think my biggest takeaway is the floor for both. If they lose anything in the arm department, Lawrence still has the legs and that's where it comes down to for me.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

And that is that might be the best arc argument for that. That might be the best argument for Trevor Lawrence and I accept that. Maybe the answer is actually Dak Prescott compliment weapons.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

And see, that's the other weapons too.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

When you get into this tier and you start to look at Trevor Lawrence, Brock Purdy, Matthew Stafford, Patrick Mahomes coming off an injury too, I mean we didn't really get into Patrick Mahomes much, but again, so much of Patrick Mahomes values are unknown right now. Because here's the very telling thing that I don't know if you guys caught this this weekend on my homes, but I saw an Andy Reid interview. Did you guys catch the Andy Reid interview that he did? No. So they asked him about staff, excuse me, about my homes. And he said, well, he's work, he's. He's working so hard and it's amazing how hard this guy works. Now what I take that to mean is you and I, all of us all know the same thing. When a guy is looking at week one where they always say, well, we're hoping he's back on the field for week one and we're looking, we're shooting for it, we're aiming for week. That's all that they talk about when a guy is not all they talk about is the other thing, which is he's working so hard and it's amazing the progress he's made and all that stuff. So that to me tells me that conversation we had on tailgate the other

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

day, I was like, what did I talk about?

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Starting.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

He's gonna start on the puzzle, go

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

back and go back and watch that show. Everybody on tailgate NFL, we had a great conversation about this first four weeks. You can give Mahomes off, give him the bye week, start him after that and just roll and hopefully he's healthy the rest of the time. And if you could just go two and two in those games, those first four games. There you go, there you have it. All Right, let's get to this next tier here. Tier 4, a mix bag here. This is more the Super Flex tier that we're in here too. So Jared Goff at 16, Kyler Murray, fascinating value at 17. I'll be honest with you. Like as a QB2, I'm fascinated, especially if QB1 really goes my way in a superflex to just kind of throw a dart on Kyler Murray. Playing for his career with Justin Jefferson, arguably the best wide receiver on the planet. Jordan Love, 18, Malik Willis at 19, Tyler Shuck at 20, Baker Mayfield at 21, C.J. stroud at 22, Sam Darnold at 23, Bryce Young at 24, Cam Ward at 25. I don't think anything's egregious here, but I do want to ask you this question here, Jake, about Baker Mayfield. Because Baker Mayfield last year first couple weeks of the season was leading the the race for mvp, injuries derailed him. Now we're looking a scenario where he doesn't have Mike Evans anymore. It's okay, we have Igbuka but again, a little bit of an unknown there. Chris Godwin's health is I feel like annually an unknown. Bucky Irving's health, I do not like the trend of this. I got to tell you this. That really is the big one that concerns me. Talk to me about Baker Mayfield. Is this a guy that you think the stock is in a good buy or a good buy like adios. I don't want to see it good

[Jake Seely]

bui like I'm buying. I understand why he's all the way down here because we just basically saw his worst season in a while and I'm not expecting this is another one. I'm pretty sure that Bring it Back Joe did it once already two years ago is going to be anomalous. That's not going to be a year we ever see from him again. But at the same time if he just repeats last year, we're still talking about QB 17, 18, 19 on any given year. Like that's right around the range of those fantasy points per game. He's 21. So you're getting them below the floor. Where there's upside here where I really think it comes down to. Yeah, you mentioned the injuries and it was everybody in this team like they were snake bitten last year and it came down to wide receiver like offensive line. Everybody dealt with injuries and I'm looking at Zach Robinson coming in and what do we know about Zach Robinson? Oh, that Sean McVeigh tree and some three wide. Oh, why do you draft Ted Hurst when you have all these options and probably don't see a lot from Ted hurst until year three or whatever. But they already did it with McMillan. You're like, well, why do you keep drafting wide receivers? Because it's a very three wide heavy offense that you're going to see a lot of the similarities from Sean McVay carried over from Zach Robinson. You're going to see Igbuka Godwin McMillan down to Ted Hurst, down to the other extraneous parts on this team. And I get what you're saying about Bucky Irving, but I think that's why they signed Kenneth Gainwell for insurance their purposes, but also a lot of pre snap motion in this offense. And what do we know we've proven over the last couple of years in fantasy, especially when it comes to pre snap motion stock up when you're using pre snap motion for the quarterbacks and wide receivers. So I'm not saying go get Baker Mayfield, but in a super flex or as your second quarterback to take that flyer on because he costs so little. He cost worse than his, basically his floor. And you can get them for the upside of that. No top 10, maybe a little aggressive, but he did throw 40 touchdowns or close to it or whatever it was that year. But 4,500 yards, he can get 4,000 yards back to 30 touchdowns. He'll be in the QB1 conversation because he's even running a little bit more late in his career, which is kind of weird too.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Yeah, it is. I will say this. I will have a lot of Kenneth Gainwell this year. I'm just going to be all over that early, especially best ball drafts. I think it's a good, I think it's a good buy. Bui to Jason, 41 touchdowns.

[Jake Seely]

I just double checked. I thought it was 40 on the nose.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Wow, you're an embarrassment to everyone. Let's talk about Malik Willis.

[Jake Seely]

That has nothing to do with missing snacks.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

That's true, that's true. It's been way before that. Jake Hearts love you. All right, let's talk about Malik Willis here for a second because this is one where the stock was kind of soaring for a little while here, especially in the dynasty leagues and all this stuff. And then everybody started like the, the harsh reality of the Dolphins rebuild I think really set into everybody and now everybody in redraft leagues has to figure out okay, what is this value with him? Now the good news is Achan got his money so we're not having any holdout situations because that to me was the biggest red flag. I was like, oh my God. If he holds out and he comes in late and he gets hurt, I don't know what the Dolphins are gonna be able to do. But talk to me about Malik Willis because I know everybody just loves the rushing upside of him. Is that enough at 19, where you want to move him up your tier here? Dbro yes, that.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

That's essentially plenty enough. I mean, we look at what Malik Willis like again, we go back to the conversation we had earlier on this show. If he runs for 7, 800, 900 yards, that's enough to vault him up. He should be in the T or higher than this. Like in six career starts from Malik Willis, he's averaged 44.8 rushing yards per game over the last three years. Amongst quarterbacks that would rank first, fourth and third. So yes, he's gonna run. We know he's gonna run. If the weapons are better, the offensive line plays better than anybody's expecting, he should be higher than this. The rushing itself should make him a top 15 quarterback.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Jake, what are your thoughts on Malik Willis? Because again, this Dolphins roster is just, it's. It's really tough from a fancy perspective to get excited about it. Plus it' a tough division and you're looking up at the Bills and the Pats and I mean, even to a certain extent, maybe you're looking up at the jets at this point too. Jets had a pretty solid draft. What are your thoughts on Malik Willis? Do you think the rushing equity is enough regardless in fantasy, or do you think that's just the only dimension to the game and it might not be enough for him to kind of move up from this tier.

[Jake Seely]

The rushings added dimension to the game, but that's why it's a worthy flyer because. And we don't need to run them down because we've been sitting here all day. But if you just look at Malik Willis's sample, and it's a super small sample, so some of those are going to get skewed. But he does check out in a lot of metrics and he's actually near the top of the league in some of the big playthroughs and stuff like that. The biggest question that you said is I think Bobby Slowik calling plays potentially like it sounds like that's what's going to happen is that that's a question mark too. We saw that how well that worked with the Texans. But all that being said is like there's been some good, there's been some bad, there's been some good and there's been some bad from Malik Willis. But I think the bigger takeaway from him as a player is that this is what needed to happen. He needed to sit in the league and learn that he was raw coming out of Liberty. There was a lot to like from him and there's a lot of aspects of everything. There's aspects of the talent from him, the talent on the roster and from Bobby Slowik. Are we going to get the goods? Are we going to get all the bads and potentially this blows up in our face. But down far, this far down the list to take. You get the added Russia dimension where if he just can be a capable quarterback, then yeah, I think it's worth the flyer. The biggest question, like you said, I think it just comes down to is his number one potentially Caleb Douglas, who I think we were all shocked by

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

how high he was drafted last tier here. This is just kind of the fun tier. This is the, you know, third quarterbacks kind of scenario. So Daniel Jones at 26, obviously unknown there with the injury return. Jacoby Brissette, again, pretty good season from him. He's got a lot of weapons. He's got the job. I'm not really worried about Carson Beck, to be honest. Fernando Mendoza at 28 eventually take that job over. Geno Smith at 29. Eventually he'll give that job up. Michael Penix at 30, Shador Sanders at 31, Tua Tongue of I Low at 32. So you got your QB battlers down here along with Aaron Rodgers. Ty Simpson at 34, again, that's a break glass and I'm still not sold on that. Kirk Cousins, DeSean Watson and JJ McCarthy, which is if everything falls apart for the Vikings. So dbro, talk to me about the Brown situation here because it is another year where the Brown situation at quarterback is a question mark. A big fat question mark. Desean Watson still getting paid. Shadora Sanders did show you, you know, a little bit last year and some spurts. So what's your take on this Browns QB situation? Is there a guy here that you think has some maybe lower red rent, super flex appeal?

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Yes, I want to be drafting Sugar Sanders a ton this year if he wins that job. I mean we just talked about like the Browns kind of ace the off season. They aced the draft. They added Casey Concepcion, Denzel Boston to Jerry Judy, Harold Fannin, a rebuilt offensive line that he might actually have clean pockets to throw from if he wins this job. In the seven starts that Shadow Sanders had last year, he was pressured at the third highest rate in the league on 50.4% of his dropbacks. When he had time and he was able to uncork the deep ball, he was really freaking good. Amongst 26 qualifying quarterbacks, at least 15 deep ball attempts guys 3rd highest accurate throw rate 13th at catchable target rate. The influx of weapons, the blocking help on the on the big in front of him. If the Browns can field an improved offense, which I think they can, and he wins this job, Shador Sanders could be a fantastic to QB3 for super flex leagues.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Jake only one quarterback in this grouping, if you look from weeks one through ten, was a top ten fantasy quarterback. He had 20 points per game on average. It's Daniel Jones. The question is the giant injury and as the now president de facto of the Daniel Jones fan club because I hate Derrick Brown and he's made me into this Daniel Jones.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Hate yourself for loving Daniel Jones. It's not my fault.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

I. I hate myself for loving you. Yet we're friends. So Daniel Jones is a big unknown. The question is at this current ADP, in this current ranking, is he intriguing to you or is it just stay away based on the injury?

[Jake Seely]

So Joe knows me long enough to know when I said goodbye to the Giants and I was already tired of the Giants and then they drafted Daniel Jones, I said, you know what? I'm going to give him one year to prove me wrong. And they didn't. And I said, said I'm out of here. I'm done with this organization. Fortunately, it looks like they got their heads on right in the front office and we might be turning the corner here. Not saying we as in.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

We as in oh, you're back in with the Giants.

[Jake Seely]

No, no.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

All that royal.

[Jake Seely]

We are turning the corner for being supportive of that team. As in like what? No, I will never call myself part of that.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

They have to.

[Jake Seely]

They have to ask me to come back anyway.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

You believe my friend.

[Jake Seely]

I'm saying we've gone so far, Joe. Like I was the Daniel Jones hater coming out of college. I was the Daniel Jones hater in NFL. I was Daniel Jones. Daniel. And now I've come full circle and all of a sudden I'm the one supporting Daniel Jones because look at this.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

The two smartest people in the room. Look at this.

[Jake Seely]

Heading into the game he got hurt. He was QB8 in fantasy points per game. Like you're the entire season until he got hurt. He was QB8 fantasy points per game. I'm not, I'm not a Daniel Jones lover like let's make that clear. Right? Same thing. He's going to run. More importantly, he's not running as much as he used to when he got that 700 yards but he's running where it's important and that's near the goal line with Jonathan Taylor because that takes so much away from the attention for Daniel Jones that it's the lesser version of Jalen Hurts is like hey guess what, you're going to focus on this. Well, we're going to take the advantage and Daniel Jones is going to go this way. So you still.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

What a surprise. It's the ex Eagles coordinator who does that. What a shot.

[Jake Seely]

Thank.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

There you go.

[Jake Seely]

Bonus point there. So just capable pass catcher which we're going to do the wide receiver show later this week and I'm on it and I actually think that Josh Downs is intriguing number two because he is now the number two with Alec Pierce. Tyler Warren is. People forgot how excited everybody was for Tyler Warren last year. He has weapons. He has a team. The biggest question you said at the top, Joe, does he have health? And then we're doing this now in May, like obviously we have time to adjust on Jackson Dart, Malik Nabors, Cam Scatterboo, Daniel Jones, we could go down the list. We have time to adjust. Bucky Irving, you brought him up earlier. There will be information that we get but as of today in May for him to be down here, assuming he's ready for week one is egregious. No matter if you hate him or love him, he should at least be in the mid teens.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

That's all I've been trying to say. Jake Seeley and thank you so much for saying it so eloquently and elegantly and putting it in the perfect context, which is I don't want to be this guy, but everyone's forcing me to be this guy and at least I know I'm not on an island by myself. So we're going to leave on this high note where Jake Seeley and I are holding hands. We could be like, you know when the parents lift a little kid in between them and Daniel Jones, that could be us. That'll probably help his leg too.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Sunburnt and ruined on a desert island together.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

You are who are the quarterbacks you believe in this year? Believe everybody who are the quarterbacks you believe in? Drop your comments below here. Subscribe to the YouTube channel over fantasy pros. We love to hear from you. We love that conversation going. You hate Matthew Stafford because he's old. You love him because he's old. You. You think Daniel Jones is too low on the board? Whatever you think, drop your comments and let's have a conversation about it. Gentlemen, great stuff as always. And if you want to check out the rankings, go to fantasypros.com rankings so you can see them for yourself. And argue away with your friends and enemies about who's high, who's low, who's just right. That'll do it for us, but the story of the game goes on. For Jake Seely and Derrick Brown, I'm Joey P. We'll see you next time, kids. Thanks for listening to the Fantasy Pros Fantasy Football Podcast.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

If you love the show, the best free way to support us is by leaving a positive review on apple [e-mail]

[Jake Seely]

review or on Spotify.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Follow us on X Instagram and TikTok Antasypros and subscribe to our YouTube channel at YouTube.com fantasypros. We all take good care of the things that matter. Our homes, our pets, our cars. Are you doing the same for your brain?

[Jake Seely]

Acting early to protect brain health may

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

help reduce the risk of dementia from conditions like Alzheimer's disease. Studies have found that up to 45% of dementia cases may be prevented or delayed.

[Jake Seely]

By managing risk factors, you can change make brain health a priority.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Ask your doctor about your risk factors and for a cognitive assessment, learn [e-mail]

[Jake Seely]

WARNING this product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical. Hey, it's the Velo guy. Listen, if Mona Lisa popped out for a smoke, all we'd have is a landscape painting at the Louvre. So yeah, be like Mona and more in the moment. Get more wherever whenever enjoyment with Velo Nicotine Pouches discover [e-mail] underage sale prohibited nicotine pouches Velo plus is a synthetic nicotine product website restricted to age 21 plus nicotine consumers. Copyright 2026 MBI Another podcast from some

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

SNL late night comedy guy. Not quite on Humor Me with Robert Smigel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenko to David Letterman help make you funnier this week. My guests SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an acapella band with their between songs banter.

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

[DBRO (Derek Brown)]

Those people are starving for banter. Listen to Humor Me with Robert Smigel and friends on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up fam?

[Joey P. (Joe P. Zappia)]

It's Isaiah Thomas, and I'm C.J. toledano, and it's our favorite time of the year on our podcast, Point Game the Playoffs. We're digging into the big surprises of the season, and I'm looking back on some of my greatest playoff moments. If we didn't talk ever again, I was firm. You just understood. That's how personal it get. Wow. Then after that, Game seven, Marquis coming to you, he's like, you know, I love you, dog. You know it's all love. This was just playoffs. This was just basketball. So listen to Point game on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Podcast Announcer]

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.