32 Fantasy Football Facts To BULLY Week 5

Welcome to week five and welcome to Stats Versus Film. This is the flagship show where we take everything that happened on the field, rewatched every single game from week four, then dive into the spreadsheets, the underlying metrics, even the statistics in the hopes of finding the answers for you to win your matchups here in week five.

Hayden, I was looking at my rosters already, stunned, punched in the face that we already have by weeks coming up. Crazy. Yeah, four teams on buy and then in my superflex league I got Lamar Jackson, Brock Purdy. So I'm having a lot of fun. So we'll talk about Dylan Gabriel plenty because somebody might be on the waiver wire hunting.

Yeah, another week of NFL football means another week of injuries means fantasy football gets turned on its head along with depth chart changes. Again, this is the show that we talk about every single team. Some more than others, but we kick things off with the top 10 headlines and that starts with the Miami Dolphins. Talk about injuries. Uh, there's two things to go through here, but the first one is the massive in Tyreek Hill who was having a heck of a game and now you will not see him for the rest of 2025 and we'll see about 2026. A dislocated knee that comes with multiple knee ligament tears on top of that.

Hayden, uh, Tyreek Hill was looking like a fine pick before this. What should we do moving forward with this Dolphins offense? And is there a one-to-one replacement on this team?

Absolutely not a one-for-one replacement on the team. I thought that Tyreek Hill's tape was actually pretty dang impressive this year. I thought that his athleticism was crazy and this injury just like it's just a reminder of how fast these players are moving on the football field. Like it's hard to see, but uh, when I was working for the Chargers, I watched Tyreek Hill up in person. Like these guys are flying so damn fast. Like these fluky injuries do happen. It's just a bummer. But uh, for the Miami Dolphins uh after Tyreek Hill left, if you're just looking at the per uh route numbers, Jaylen Waddle 31% targets per route. So everything's kind of cleared the way for Jaylen Waddle to get back into the every week fantasy uh starter tier. No, Johnny Smith um from the offseason helps out. And then Jaylen Waddle is going to be the clear-cut uh top target in the offense. Mike McDaniel after the injury uh somebody asked him like, "Hey, who's the one-for-one replacement?" and he said this is going to be a committee approach to replace that and it's not just including the wide receiver group which I thought was notable which obviously means Devon Achan but also uh Darren Waller was the other big standout player from this game.

We'll put a pin in the Darren Waller conversation here in a moment. Just first in the wide receivers um right now Jaylen Waddle is the wide receiver 27. He was drafted as the wide receiver 29 when many of your leagues closed out there. He is the wide receiver 12 in terms of average money per year in terms of his contract. Uh, so far I don't think the Dolphins have gotten their money's worth when it comes to that. They have a really difficult time just simply incorporating him in the offense on a week-to-week basis in comparison to Tyreek Hill. They need to get their money's worth the rest of the way. And maybe he will be, you know, put into motion a bit more often in these stacked formations, these crossing routes over the middle of the field. That is the closest one. I do want to bring up Malik Washington who is a preseason superstar when both Waddle and Tyreek would sit out of those preseason games. Literally about 70% of the targets were going in Malik Washington's belly and he was again also being used on these like horizontal full speed movement things. I do want to note that at least to my eyeballs when Tyreek Hill left the game and the Dolphins use, you know, multiple personnel groupings with multiple tight ends and they get Alec Engold to fullback in there, it was not Malik Washington, uh, in there in two wide receiver sets. It was our beloved Nick Westbrook-Ihenacho, Mr. Regression Touchdown himself. So, who knows if that sticks with a full week of practice moving forward, but that's how I would think of it is Jaylen Waddle as the primary and then NWI as a secondary and then three wide receiver sets, Malik Washington pops in.

I do think Malik Washington will absorb some of the manufactured touches, but not enough to get into like the fantasy mix, maybe in a really deep league during by weeks and stuff. We'll probably pop up for a couple nice games, but I think there's not enough uh volume to kind of pass around because Achan's going to get what 15, 20% targets. And then I think that the Darren Waller stuff was was actually very real from this last game.

He looked pretty good like in the first quarter was a third and five. They motioned him across man coverage just crosses uh the defender's face for a chunk gain. Obviously that was a beautiful touchdown to get his feet in against you know, Sauce Gardner that was just like just beating Sauce Gardner right from the jump. That was super impressive. And then obviously the runaway route for the second score. So he was not a full-time player in his return. I don't think that we should expect him to be a complete full-time player, but I do think we'll get more two tight end sets where he's operating as basically a wide receiver. And I think that the the two people that are going to get more involved than they already were in the offense, it's going to be Jaylen Waddle gets a big bump and then I think that Darren Waller is actually the biggest beneficiary uh with Tyreek Hill not going to be part of the lineup. So, I'm actually very intrigued. Darren Waller, 9.3 expected fantasy points uh in his debut and I think that he should be picked up uh in in on the waiver wire this week and I do think that there's a chance he can be a top 12 uh fantasy tight end moving forward.

Yeah, only played 28% of snaps. It shocked me how good he looked because he barely practiced during training camp. There was even comments when Mike McDaniel was asked about him of, hey, this thing has to happen soon or we'll see what happens. And when a head coach says things like that, my brain instantly jumped to, well, I don't think Darren Waller is going to be on this roster moving forward. And man, I was wrong. Like, he steps in here and just makes a difference in comparison. It's very different to the stuff though that Johnny Smith was doing. So, I I don't want to like copy paste what a tight end did last year in this offense versus what Darren Waller is. He's more of like a go up and get it basketball high point catcher in one-on-one situations whereas Johnny Smith truly was like manufactured screen stuff swings behind the line of scrimmage uh horizontal more so. But they need both skill sets. So obviously Darren Waller signed with the Dolphins because of his former position coach in Frank Smith who is the offensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins. And to me his snaps will only go up from here. I'm not saying he's going to score two touchdowns every single week. But at the same time, they lose their primary pass catcher. So, this is a team who's already second in the league in terms of an 80% red zone touchdown success rate. That is nutso stuff. And Darren Waller can be a huge part of that red zone offense moving forward.

Yeah, especially if they don't have like the rushing success like when the field gets condensed down in the red area. I do think that Waller's going to be like a very big part of of that offense. Last night I had from the Dolphins, what a game for Mike McDaniel. I mean, all the trick stuff, uh, but also just like getting to it to actually throw the ball to the perimeter. Uh, Tyreek was wide open for most of the game as well. We got Jaylen Waddle on some some nice, uh, touches over the middle as well. So, I was super impressed. They got Darren Waller using uh him to the best ability. So, to me, man, I just am always pretty dang impressed with the Mike McDaniel offense. I think that he's making the most out of a fairly limited quarterback with continuously one of the bottom three worst offensive lines out there. The fact that they even pop up for like top 10 numbers at any point, I think is super impressive. So, big shout out to him.

And that's not even mentioning Devon Achan, who's the running back eight overall right now in fantasy football and has not scored fewer than 12.6 fantasy points in a single game this season. Final note, this kind of feels like a sunset on the career of Tyreek Hill. Tyreek Hill, one of the best fantasy football wide receivers of the last decade at the very least. It kind of feels in a similar fashion as to when we said fantasy football goodbye to Antonio Brown. So, I just wanted to call that out because who knows for a speedy, even physical wide receiver what this type of knee injury is going to do for his future.

Yeah, probably not even in 2026. Just a brutal injury for a 30-plus-year-old. But, I mean, he averaged like 90 yards over like six seasons on two different teams. Like, he's he's one of the best wide receivers of the decade.

New York Jets are next, their opponent. This one's fascinating because the spreadsheets liked what the New York Jets did in this game. My eyeballs really didn't. Uh, I mean, they had the second best success rate in week four in terms of offense. And what that means basically is first and second downs, they picked up half the yards that they needed. Third and fourth downs, they got all the yards that they needed. Uh, again, when you look at Justin Fields' passing chart, he's basically throwing the football at five yards.

Mhm. 80% of the time and that's it. So, they were a success rate monster, Hayden. But again, in terms of overall explosives that you can count on a weekly basis, in terms of a consistent passing attack with rhythm and identity, uh, to me at least, there's a lot to be left here.

There definitely was, but I do think this was like still a decent game for the Jets themselves. I think the opponent was really, really, you know, bad as well, so that's of note. But the Fields' touchdown was ridiculous. Like there's only maybe a couple quarterbacks ever that it would have scored on that one. Uh, but really to me, there's a couple standout guys. One, Garrett Wilson. The touchdown grab was obviously phenomenal. The offensive pass interference that they called on him was super ticky-tacky. That should have been another touchdown for him. So he's obviously having um some some big explosive plays in this offense. They got Mason Taylor going as well and they said that they were going to do that. A lot of it was just kind of like zone field stuff. uh nothing like really one-on-one, but uh that was a pretty good game for a rookie tight end. And then I wanted to ask you about what you're seeing from Breece Hall because there was a couple opportunities in this one where he had the chance to kind of open it up in space and like never really like fully got there and he kind of like I'm not saying was running with a limp, but he did not look like one of like the 10 best uh running backs uh out there. And obviously with Breece Hall having that that knee injury and that fumble early on. Um, I was hoping that Breece Hall I would like see that extra gas and for whatever reason like he seems to be like super athletic on on one game and then like the next game seems to be playing through something. So I'm not sure if you saw similarly on tape.

I think in this game either his second or third carry he took a pretty hard fall or like a knee slide along the sideline. You saw him wincing on the sideline and I don't know if he was ever the same after that. Uh, I hear you. And Armon Mustipher looks great at right tackle. And look, right now, Breece Hall, I believe, is the running back 25. Uh, he's had two 13-plus-point games and then two fewer than seven-point games. Um, and now you move from a three-person pie to a two-person pie because Israel Abanikanda and specifically in terms of high-value touches near the goal line uh was about to score then fumbles and gets it punched out and then the next kickoff nearly fumbles and gets his MCL taken out and he's headed to IR. So, while Breece Hall uh might not look as explosive as he did in week one, Hayden his share of the pie should definitely go up and to me it's even more magnified that almost certainly he's going to see more carries inside the 10, inside the five once they get there. Now, he'll be battling Justin Fields in that area, too. But what he'll still probably lose is that pure passing down work because that's where Isaiah Davis does his best. But who even knows? Like maybe they just don't want Breece inside the 10-yard line and that also goes to Isaiah Davis. I'm just guessing here.

Yeah. Yeah. Who knows? I think that Breece Hall is obviously big stock up just because you're removing Israel Abanikanda, but it's just curious. He just seems to be like in and out of like being Breece Hall versus a shell of himself. Uh, didn't want to mention this in the past game to go to your point about all the checkdown stuff. Only it's the Jets and the Eagles complete outliers and how many pass attempts they're even attempting beyond 15 uh air yards down the field. So, like look at like where the Cowboys and the Bucs are and stuff. And then you have the Jets and the Eagles way over there. So, that's just not going to help. And they're also uh dead last in neutral pass rate um this season.

That brings me to my point where I I understand the success rate stuff. We cited it often with a bunch of these teams. But at the same time, that's who they want to be in terms of just turning out these yards and sustaining these long drives. At the same time, 13 and 14 play drives give you more opportunities to make a mistake, like more opportunities to fumble or for them, more opportunities to have penalties. I mean, 13 penalties for 101 yards here. There were other, you know, coaching deficiencies that were on full display. The muffed kickoff obviously, and then the same guy down to punt and fair caught it at his own two-yard line. Like again, if you're just trying to grind out these long drives and then your quarterback is basically like a no-no, oh, there's a big play just when you least expect it and that's tough to count on, even if it is Justin Fields, which we absolutely love in fantasy football, then you basically have to be perfect on the fringes. And right now, the Jets are anything but perfect on the fringes. And this defense looks way worse than it did last year despite having many and I mean many of the same pieces that Robert Saleh and Jeff Ulbrich had.

Yeah. The Jets defense I'll just call it straight up bad, you know, like.

I mean, they're they're 0 and 4 and that's how they wanted to play a football game against a really bad defense that we saw on Monday night and then they still didn't win. So we'll see. I mean, they've had two close games we know week one and they gave that one away to Pittsburgh. I just am not sure how much that is going to change for the scene. Like this is their identity.

This like felt like kind of the expectations. There's going to be some wild moments from everybody involved and then like the down-to-consistency just like not going to be good enough uh to like win enough football games this year.

Other Monday Night Football game, Denver Broncos first. JK Dobbins the first 100-plus-yard rusher in a Broncos uniform in the last 38 games. They put a bully session on the Cincinnati Bengals defense and that allowed them to play Dobbins for 36 snaps and rookie RJ Harvey for 33 snaps and he performed as a top 15 scoring running back because of a wide-open receiving touchdown at the end.

Yeah, this was good for both of them. The offense is still just being kept alive by their offensive line which performed very well once again. Uh, lots of different types of runs from Sean Payton, too. Like both of these guys were running it up the middle, then also having opportunities to show off their speed, which I think both of them uh their best traits collectively from the backfield. Uh, after the game, they said they wanted to get Dobbins and Harvey like more like drives. It didn't play out where like one guy gets a drive, but they would get like multiple plays in a row to try to build up some chemistry. And obviously, that's going to help RJ Harvey stay on the field a little bit more than he did previously. So that was a season-high 15.3 expected half PPR points. Obviously he was aided because late in the game uh he got like the last drive and obviously he was left wide open and they're not always just going to be beating teams what 28 to 3 or whatever it was. So uh this is good to see that RJ Harvey looked the part. JK Dobbins also looked the part. So I think it's going to be kind of status quo 1A 1B with Tyler Batty uh kind of hanging out on two-minute drills.

The quote that you're referring to is one thing we did different on Monday. There are certain tags that put either one in, but we gave them a series and that helped them both. From Sean Payton, quote, "It's easier to call plays and both of them got in good rhythms. Those guys both ran hard. I thought we blocked them well."

Yes.

I am not saying that JK Dobbins should be losing snaps at all. He's playing great football, but at the same time, I can highlight that I thought RJ Harvey looked quite good in this game and he definitely does not have the we're going to bounce it outside the tackles issues. He was staying very patient, I thought, between the tackles. And then there were two plays that they called specifically for him. The one was, you know, that route down the rail that uh Bonick fires a pass, it hits him on his fingertips and he can't come down with it. That would have been a huge chunk gain if not a touchdown. And then a former high school recruit quarterback in RJ Harvey gets a Wildcat carry that they motion out of at the goal line. And that's the one he has to bounce off because Geno Smith fills the lane that he's hoping to go into. I wouldn't be surprised if we see him get a Wildcat pass towards the later end of this year just because they're kind of setting it up with that one play.

Yeah, he's feeling a little bit more like the Joker because the Evan Engram stuff is not working out at all. I mean, get your toe in. That was insane. And he had that other drop there as well. So, he's just like not a focal point of the offense, not a full-time player still for Evan Engram. Uh, last guy we need to talk about here to me is just Courtland Sutton.

Um, another I looked it up. um 50-plus yards and a touchdown since 2023 when he like fully broke out after that injury. He has 15 games of that uh which is like right there third most in the league with all your favorite superstars. So 50 for a touchdown is Mr. Courtland Sutton and on that one really nice. There was a safety hanging out in the right in the middle of the end zone and he was just like buying himself just enough time breaking that out before cutting back in. So, just a veteran play and Bonix looking a little bit more comfortable and had like truly all day long uh to throw passes in this one.

Wide receiver 11, Courtland Sutton. Right now, we got a great comment from Pat is doing stuff on X that quote, "Courtland Sutton is exactly the guy I would have passed on in recent years in drafts before taking the quote, 'eat your vegetables' advice from Josh and Hayden. He's so damn consistent. Great shout, fellas." Hayden, sometimes uh vanilla is exactly what you need.

To me, he's not even vanilla. He just mosses everybody. I don't know. He's throwing guys off.

It's because he's he's he's old and not one of these young wide receivers. That's what I.

I get it. I get it.

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Cincinnati Bengals their opponent. There's a lot to go into. Let's do the non-Jamar Chase items first. Okay. Chase Brown right now is the running back 32. And Hayden, to me, sometimes I'm not saying people are only citing these things, but at times I think too often we look at snap shares and, you know, opportunity shares and all this stuff. Chase Brown is still getting all of that that he got last year, but it doesn't matter because this team cannot function. They cannot get first downs. He's getting no rushing room. And again, even despite playing 80-plus% of the snaps, he's running back 32 on the season. Any thoughts by you?

The last two games without Burrow, 11 and 8.5 expected half PPR points. So he's on the field a ton, but if you're not getting down to the red area, it doesn't really matter and then all the explosiveness are just not going to be there when you know teams can kind of focus and clamp down on the entire offense. The offensive line is a stone cold disaster and Chase Brown's not good enough to dig him out of the the hole. So he's like one of the least efficient running backs in my model and his usage is down six, seven, eight spots off of his previous high. So, um, I guess he's like the running back 32 in my weekly rankings and stuff, but there's some committee guys I think I would be playing over Chase Brown. Um, the one note I did want to mention, this is going to be the bottom of what we saw from the Bengals. You faced the Vikings and then the Broncos. Like I get we should have full-blown panics and then we should recalibrate and talk about how easy their their schedule is for the rest of the season and how you're not going to face these two ludicrous defenses uh from the last two weeks. So, I think that Chase Brown and T. Higgins I'm like most fearful of and then I'm maybe I'm willing to buy low on Jamar Chase coming up just based off the schedule and what I saw from them uh this last night.

So we talk about sometimes model breakers like if one of these running backs had an expected rank of 32 but he was performing as you know, 16 overall then that's someone who breaks models.

They do that because either they're really good, they're having fluky plays, or they're on really good teams. Yep. Uh, Chase Brown is the opposite of that, right? His expected rank is 16 and despite all this volume and everything that he's getting, it's being tanked because he's on a terrible team and so he's running back 32 right now.

Yep. So yeah, all all these charts you can kind of see the players underperforming and Chase Brown right right here is like the guy standing out the most. Uh, so it's just it's just an untenable situation behind this offensive line. It's like not going to get better. Like there's not somebody that they're like waiting for to break out and stuff like this is like just the bad offensive line that Joe Burrow was going to work around and then even if like Russell Wilson or Jameis Winston, you pick Kirk Cousins, none of those quarterbacks that would be coming over are good enough or mobile enough to overcome this offensive line too. So like maybe like they get a slight upgrade but there's not going to just be this like massive turnaround here. So like we have to like talk about this at the margins. So I think like T. Higgins will have some like jump ball moments. Uh, but his consistency is gone. Chase Brown's explosiveness is going to be completely gone. So to me, like the fantasy conversation is like truly only about one guy. It's like what do we do with Jamar Chase?

Well, T. Higgins is wide receiver 59 right now. Since we've covered those two names, let's talk about Jamar Chase. You cited the schedule. Okay, they just faced the Minnesota Vikings who are great versus pass rushes, especially defenses or especially offenses that are, you know, quarterbacked by backups. And then it's the Denver Broncos with their pass rush against this offensive line and Patrick Surtain coming up for this team. It is the Detroit Lions and then the Green Bay Packers. Those are the next two. So I sent you some names ahead of time on if you would trade Jamar Chase for these guys straight up. All right. So Jamar Chase right now is wide receiver 21. Would you trade him for Quinton Johnston who's wide receiver four right now?

I would put that one in about the same tier. I think I would keep Jamar Chase though.

Would you do it for Keenan Allen who's wide receiver 13 right now?

I want Jamar Chase.

Then I'm already have my answer moving forward. Deebo Samuel who's wide receiver 10 right now on a much better offense.

Now that one I think is pretty close because Deebo looks really good and that offense is pretty functional. So I'll say that's like about the same tier as well. And I think I will take my chances uh and continue with Jamar Chase.

Jamar Chase or Nico Collins who's wide receiver 20 right now?

Nico Collins for sure.

Okay. Jamar Chase or Jaylen Waddle, who now has potentially a new role in his wide receiver 27 right now.

Wow, that one's close. I think I'll go Waddle and I I'll view Waddle as a top uh 24 wide receiver moving moving forward. And then I think I'll put Jamar Chase as a top 24 wide receiver moving forward as well. Um, and I think that I'll just call like I think that Jamar Chase for a lot of people I would call him more of a buy low. Like I think the bottom is in. And this isn't even disagreeing with what you were saying uh in our previous rankings episodes when I think what consensus rankings last week was like wide receiver.

They had him as wide receiver five and he has never only one time only one time Jamar Chase has finished as a top 30 scoring wide receiver with Jake Browning at quarterback over eight games.

For sure. Uh, and I had him like in in the 20s and that was in a really bad situation. I think it's going to get a little bit better. This last game I was watching it in crucial situations the safety was also just like double-teaming him and then it's against Patrick Surtain. So I just don't think that every team's going to be able to do that and the schedule especially in the fantasy playoffs and stuff if you can get there it really opens up and I think this Lions team is it's it's a team that you really can't run the ball on them and you can pass the ball a ton. So, I do think that if you're gonna call Jamar Chase a buy low at any point, it would be this week. And I think it might be worth worth just a trade offer to that team just because that owner might be fully panicking and not viewing him even as like a top 30 wide receiver. And to me, the rest of the season, I would call him a top 24 wide receiver. Uh, not a top 10 one, but somewhere kind of in that wide receiver 2 mix. Do you think as pitiful of a performance as it was on Monday, Zac Taylor getting nervous for his job security even with, you know, making a Super Bowl previously? Could this force them with how bad they were to make a quarterback move?

I I don't know why they wouldn't rule that out. Like, it makes sense to me. I mean, the the context is Lamar Jackson's now out for the next couple weeks and they're one and three. the rest of the division like to me is like still like it sounds crazy but it's relatively up for grabs if they can either, you know, get Jake Browning to feel a little bit more comfortable or they go get a quarterback upgrade. But I think there are some guys available in the quarterback market that would like help Jamar Chase and T. Higgins out. And it would be I feel like you'd feel silly if you traded Jamar Chase away. They made a a trade for a quarterback and all of a sudden it's not going to be a good offense, but it's a serviceable one with one of the best wide receivers in the game. Uh, I feel like that would just be kind of silly. I am still nervous over these next two weeks. Like the Lions defense, while they don't have Patrick Surtain, I do think like they can roll a safety over top and then Aidan Hutchinson and this pass rush can get after it a little bit. And again, I understand the Packers just got torched by Dak Prescott. But Dak Prescott is just much better than Jake Browning, like you know, just so to me it's not just, hey, does this team have a quarterback that can match up with Jamar Chase? It's okay, how is this offensive line going to Yeah. hold up to this offense to this pass rush and we know the Cowboys one played above and beyond any expectations against the Packers and even when they did get home Dak was rifling passes down the field and I just don't know if Jake Browning can do that. So yeah, like one of the names I was going to ask you about is Chris Olave who is wide receiver 32 right now. But to me Chase and Olave are very similar in that they're both going to get volume and it's going to be shorter receptions and shorter targets. And maybe that's the frame of mind we need to be looking at with Chase at this current form of the Bengals as well as he can, you know, break a number of tackles on a single catch and take 160 yards. And I don't think Olave can necessarily do that.

Yeah, there's fewer 25-plus-yard targets with Jake Browning versus Joe Burrow and then more targets at the line of scrimmage in that kind of sweet spot at like eight yards down the field. That's where we're kind of missing a lot of the uh targets to Jamar Chase. Just quick because you you were peppering me with Jamar Chase questions. Rest of season, pick a number. So, we're talking about week five all the way through. Where does Jamar Chase finish? Like throw the last couple weeks out just moving forward. Is he a wide receiver blank?

He is wide receiver 24 the rest of the way.

Final one for you. He's even more underperforming than Jamar Chase has been so far. Brian Thomas Jr. who's wide receiver 44 at this moment.

I'll take Jamar Chase.

Okay. All right. And by the way, if you make a move based on instant questions I asked Hayden, that is totally on you. Do not go back and hold these names and these preferences on Hayden at the end of the season. We just answering these throw out questions uh ahead of week five and things change on a freaking weekly basis as you all can tell.

For entertainment purposes only.

Okay, Green Bay Packers, speaking of. So, we saw really the first game fully not facing a Cleveland Browns defense without Jaden Reed. And what we got was three Romeo Doubs touchdowns uh and then Michael Wilson out there catching a 46-yarder. Now, to me, there are some details to talk about with both of those. First, with Romeo Doubs, he was consistently lining up as the X wide receiver in like these 3x1 sets. So, they would get, let's say, Michael Wilson and Dontayvion Wicks and Tucker Kraft on one side. They would put them in tight splits, stack them, even do some quick motions between them, and then, you know, Jordan Love would see either off coverage or a one-on-one chance for Romeo Doubs on the opposite side, and he was constantly taking that one. And that's good to know because, you know, his alert has often been and will be continuing uh Romeo Doubs. So, he is still a mainstay in this offense. Now, on the Michael Wilson front, he finally caught a deep pass. Hayden, I couldn't tell if Jordan Love was actually targeting Michael Wilson 46.

He was absolutely not.

Yeah. So, Michael Wilson and Dontayvion Wicks are running literally within three feet of each other and Wilson is the one that catches it. So, that made his day to be honest. It did.

It did. Now, uh, I completely agree. Let's go with Romeo Doubs first. I will be ranking him ahead. I think that he's underrated right now. Jaden Reed is going to be out for a very long time in this offense is good. Uh, that was the goal line fade and that was just pretty much just Jordan Love seeing the one-on-one and liking that versus running the ball up the middle and then that slant route which is like what you talked about on the backside as well. So, those were both like very real plays and I think that they really like running the Doubs who's a full-time player. 16.2 expected fantasy points a lot from last week. Michael Wilson, they did give him a couple screen attempts early in that game as well. So, he was running some downfield routes. Now, he also was running backwards on one of the screen attempts, which you don't love to see. Um, he also got absolutely lit up on that punt where he just like hit the spin move for no reason in the middle of the field. So, yeah, we're we're working through this. Michael Wilson's route participation did drop like I think it was like 14 percentage points, which you don't love to see. There's going to be a little bit of a rotation. Um, but yeah, like that Michael Wilson, Dontayvion Wicks that easily could have been a touchdown. So, I'm very curious to see like if they'll talk about that because I think maybe Dontayvion Wicks was kind of like freelancing. He put his hands out uh and working down the field. Um, but they converged at the same spot and the Dontayvion Wicks' corner is actually the one who tackled Michael Wilson. So, um, we got a couple more screen attempts in this one. Got the downfield stuff. He's just not playing as much as I'd like. He's he's kind of turning into Jaden Reed, which has been.

Frustrating. Exactly. That's what I was going to bring up. Uh, he got some of the shifts, full speed motions, fly motions, all that stuff that Jaden Reed was getting behind the line of scrimmage. And if we just look at snap shares, I mean Romeo Doubs is all the way up at 90% which is really tough to find among a Packers wide receiver.

Dontayvion Wicks was at 77 and then Wilson was at 59 and Malik Heath at 23 and my guy Sevon Williams there at 12%. So this rotation is is going to continue. Yep. If it hits this season, Michael Wilson feels like it's going to be like a post-bye rookie bump styling of a player.

But then the other part here is they just, you know, spread the rock. If we just look over the entire season, Tucker Kraft leads this team with 18% of the targets, then Romeo Doubs at 17%, then Wicks at 14%, and then like right after that is Michael Wilson. So all these guys are very, very close, and we're going to talk about some names later that are at like 36% target shares.

Yeah, definitely. So, uh, quickly on that, Tucker Kraft is also, he had three screens in this last one, too. So, some of the manufactured stuff is actually going to the tight end. He got tackled at the one-yard line. To me, he looks like a Diet Coke version of George Kittle right now. He's he's a sensational player, and they know that and they're going to continue to give him the ball. And then last note, usage wise, Josh Jacobs through four weeks, running back two in expected half PPR points. So total monster out there playing through that cut and whatnot, but he's he's going to have a chance to score 15 touchdowns uh this year and he's going to be a fantastic round two three selection.

Running back seven overall, Josh Jacobs is at this moment. Okay, their opponents who they tied the Dallas Cowboys, uh, Javonte Williams is the running back six, one spot ahead of Josh Jacobs. But obviously the big conversation is George Pickens after that wide receiver 63 finish in week one. You know, a warning that they played zone coverage, that he saw a bunch of K'Von Wallace, that Vic Fangio doesn't prevent long receptions. He's been the wide receiver 14, 16, and wide receiver two ever since then. Uh, your expectations moving forward or what?

Extremely high. I mean, I had a very aggressive ranking last week, and I'm just getting more bullish. Remember, like he also was tackled at the one-yard line, and that was almost another touchdown, and they gave him another jump ball situation in the uh red zone as well. So, he is beyond a focal point of the pass game. 16.4 and 16.6 expected fantasy points in the two games without CeeDee Lamb. Those are monster wide receiver one no questions asked numbers and usage. Um, I think he looks pretty good. There was a couple slants uh some dig routes as well. So there's going to be some like yards after the catch potential uh in this offense which we we really have never seen with George Pickens. And then like this was just an incredible game from Dak Prescott. Like one of the best you'll see the entire season like doing this against that defense in that environment.

Yep. Without your center and your first-round right guard and your left tackle not playing well uh as well like that one play out of structure throwing it down down down the sideline to Tolbert and stuff like this was incredible football play from Dak Prescott who I did not think had a good season last year but this year looks like one of like the five best quarterbacks in the NFL uh especially considering some of the the injuries of the elite guys. So what a performance from all these guys.

The next three games are incredible as well. They face the New York Jets, then the Carolina Panthers, and then the Washington Commanders over the next three weeks. So, Dak might be on what we said when CeeDee was healthy in terms of being like number one in passing yards this season. Uh, and then Jake Ferguson continues to remain as one of the best assets at tight end. He is the tight end two on the season right now, over 12 fantasy points in three straight games. We'll get into some of these names as we go along, but none of the top four tight ends were drafted in the top, I don't know, seven or even eight rounds. Hunter Henry, Jake Ferguson, Dalton Kincaid, Tucker Kraft. It's a very long season. We will see what happens. But every year, you know, it's just a constant conversation of, hey, even if you like one of these top guys, just know that some of the later mid and especially late round tight ends have done the best in terms of values in recent years. And that's not even mentioning, you know, Juwan Johnson is tight end seven right now.

Yeah. Jake Ferguson in like complete catch-up mode is going to catch a bunch of passes. We saw that two weeks ago. Uh, and there's going to be some games where the Cowboys, you know, give up what, 40 points like they did in this one. The defense still looks really terrible. And then in this game, Jake Ferguson, they motion him out at the goal line to get him one-on-one and Dak Prescott immediately looks to him for that touchdown. Like not a lot of tight ends in the league are going to get motioned out to set up a slant route touchdown. So that was pretty cool to see. So really aggressive uh play calling. Uh, I think that the ground game is like looks really good and I think that that comes from the Arizona offense from from the last couple seasons that we really liked on the ground. So even Javonte Williams, man, like season high 20 expected fantasy points without your center, without your right guard against the Packers. Like, woo.

Yeah. Now I do want to bring up they played an entire overtime on top of it. So, it's like an extra added quarter here. So, that does amplify a couple things. But Miles Sanders is out. You know, Miles Sanders is injured. So.

If this doesn't offer like Jalen Blue an opportunity for the believers out there, then what is going to and if that even matters based on how Javonte Williams looks at this point. It really doesn't matter.

He looks good. Like, straight up, he looks good. Again, we talked about it a couple weeks ago, the floor for Javonte Williams because just the overall offense is better this year was where Rico Dowdle finished last season. That was pretty evident after week one and I think he finished as running back 17 or 19 last year. So, you're getting a top five running back.

Right now.

Wow.

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New York Giants are next. So in his NFL debut, Jackson Dart finished as quarterback 11 on the week with 19.88 fantasy points, which is Hayden signifying to me uh he is one of these quarterbacks who has a rushing floor and a passing ceiling, meaning that he only threw for what, a hundred yards. Yeah.

But still nearly achieved 20 points. And so the quality passing numbers are going to be the avenue for him to finish as a top five, top six quarterback on a weekly basis. Uh, but your thoughts on if that is possible this year without Malik Nabers?

Yeah, it just makes it a lot more difficult. I think he's firmly a quarterback two. And if he finishes as a top 12 quarterback rest of the season, that would be like amazing. Um, I do think that the rushing stuff is extremely real. A lot of that was by design in this one, including the red area uh touchdown where they use Cam Scarbrough as a lead blocker. Um, and then on a draw play for Jackson Dart. Jackson Dart's like one of the like truck stick guys on third and one as well. It was an energizing game from those two. These guys are out of their mind. Scarbrough and uh Jackson Dart. So, uh I watched this game live. Uh, what did you see when you went back to the All 22 and rewatched everything?

Yeah, I saw someone say that this is a Daboo offense, which very much the case. It actually reminded me, and I don't want anyone to take offense to this, especially Giants fans. It reminded me a lot of like the 2022 Daniel Jones Brian Daboll stuff where uh they really maximized the quarterback movement and then.

Kind of won on the fringes. And by winning on the fringes in this game, it was their defense setting up for them twice inside of the three-yard line on the opposition's side. That's not going to happen very much.

And even the play-calling, you know, you can bring in the Old Miss stuff too. Uh, I would say it was kind of like Trey Lance-ish on top of this a little bit, in that there really wasn't a drop-back passing game at all.

Um, so did I expect a drop-back passing game in week one against, you know, a Jesse Minter defense? No. Uh, do I want to see that more so when we move forward in week two and week three and week four as a starter? And is that going to be more difficult without Malik Nabers? 100%. But I literally can't take anything away from, like, this passing game or like him as a passer from this game.

But, um, you know, we have seen Brian Daboll win games that he wasn't supposed to by kind of coaching around the strengths of some of his players, and he's going to get some good moments and drives from this rushing attack. I do wonder if they go up against a defensive line or a defensive front that now know how much of a focus the quarterback run game is going to be, like what the counterpunch is from there? Because again, I just got no answers from week one if that's going to happen.

Yeah, nothing in the normal dropback game at all in this one, and he dropped his eyes too quickly on a lot of plays. He was playing very fast, and he just seemed like he was super amped, which I think ended up working in his favor, but also did work against him in the normal dropback game. So, uh, yeah, I think it was more of a fun game than like a great game from the offense, but, um, that's a lot better than what we've seen from the Giants the last couple seasons.

Uh, Cam Akers, real quick, season-high 22.4 expected fantasy points in this one. Got goal-line usage. Something to watch with him, his leg drive and just turning through the tackles. And what he does, he'll do this like jump thing to squeeze through. He's a, he's a thick dude, right? But he'll, he'll jump right through two offensive linemen and he hits the ground and then turns those legs.

I think he's very impressive. Like, I'm not even like grading this on like, oh, he's just a rookie. He's fun. He's like a meme. Like, I think he's just like straight up a good running back in the NFL already.

Yeah. I, again, we always appreciate the running styles of Dave Montgomery or the James Conner "get off me" stuff, and Cam Akers brings that hammer mentality to the league. And yeah, it just, it never made any sense to me why, like, big draft didn't like him. He's just such an enjoyable watch and how he wins it translates already to the league, and it's just, it's so fun to see.

Uh, the last thing on Jackson Dart is, if there was one thing I want him to work on and you can see improvement into his second start, it would be taking fewer sacks. Like, to me, at least three of them were incredibly avoidable, and, um, those were on like first and second down. I think one was on third down.

Um, so if he improves that, then like that's a nice step in the right direction, and then we kind of go from there.

Anything on Wandale Robinson and Darius Slayton? We talked about this on the waiver wire show, like we're going to rank Wandale ahead of Darius Slay. I think Slay's gonna have some moments in this when he drew that that pass interference or holding call in the red area. But Wandale is going to get the gimme looks. I think a lot more of the RPO/Old Miss stuff's probably going to go to Wandale. But if he's in my top 30 wide receivers next week, are is that surprising to you?

I honestly have zero comments about this passing game. I don't even know what it looks like. Like, uh, there was the shovel to Theo Johnson. There was another pass to Theo Johnson. There were just other times where, you know, especially on like corner routes or sideline routes, ones were open. There was a, you know, three-level concept that he just didn't throw, instead took a sack. There was another one to Theo Johnson that he dropped his eyes and kind of moved around a bit too often.

So, as I just don't have an answer here. I know he's also going to test Darius Slayton at some point in one-on-one coverage. And with the rushing prowess that maybe this backfield duo does have, if that sucks them into more single-high looks, yeah, then that should allow Darius Slayton to have these opportunities. You just wish that was Malik Nabers.

Baltimore Ravens. Derrick Henry is running back 19 right now. Lamar Jackson, more importantly, is out with a hamstring injury. Uh, they've, I think, already ruled him out here for week five. Then they are playing a different team in week six, and then they have a week seven bye. Hayden, I don't think it's totally out of the question that unless he's, I don't know, 85, 90% in week six, that we don't see Lamar Jackson till week eight again.

Man, they're really going to be up against it in the win-loss column. And the Ravens, I think they lost like six or seven starters now, um, on their defense, like including Marlon Humphrey, Nate Wiggins. Uh, their best player on defense, uh, up front is out for the season. Um, Kyle Van Noy hasn't played in a little bit. Roquan Smith is is banged up. It's, it's a disaster on the Ravens defense. And then on offense too, Ronnie Stanley played only a couple snaps in this last one before he left. And then on top of that, I love Lamar Jackson. Lamar Jackson is like, kind of lost in the pocket. He's just like not throwing the football, and there's not like a bunch of separation. Sometimes he like throws it to Mark Andrews or, uh, DeAndre Hopkins, and they're just getting completely clamped. There's like not that much speed beyond Zay Flowers right now, but it is a disaster. The offensive line doesn't play, isn't playing well, but Lamar Jackson is like, does not look like Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen, uh, and some of the other elite quarterbacks this year. Um, and and that, and that's definitely worrisome.

Who knew the key to the entire offense working was Patrick Ricard, who has not played this season? They can't do much of anything without him. Uh, again, I wanted to bring up Derrick Henry because if, if the Ravens are worse this year, and who knows what Cooper Rush brings to this team after he was somewhat productive.

I know exactly what we're getting.

Then you're going to get more of these bad Derrick Henry games. Again, he is one of the most game script dependent players. When you are neutral or leading, he can just absolutely pound away in terms of these long, long gains and then just, you know, stack them up over and over again. But again, when you're down by 14, 10, whatever, it's pretty clear that another back, uh, whether it be, you know, with the Tennessee Titans or now with the Baltimore Ravens, and now it's Justice Hill versus Dion Lewis, then someone else is going to get the opportunities in there. So, this, yeah, this Ravens team isn't close to as good as they were last season, and then they're just getting even more injured on top of it. The next two teams are the Texans and that defensive line, and then the Rams and that defensive line, and then the bye week.

It's not good. Just this chart that's on the screen right here is just comparing Derrick Henry this year versus last year. He's still getting the explosive runs. The big difference is he's getting tackled at and behind the line of scrimmage far more than those five, six, seven, eight-yard carries. And usually, like, it would just be like a five-yard carry, five-yard carry, five-yard, 30-yard carry. This year, it's like negative one, punt, negative two, 20-yard carry, and they're just not moving the the the ball nearly as well as before. So, and Lamar's taking more sacks than he ever has on top of it. So, I don't know what, like, where the hell am I going to be ranking Derrick Henry without Lamar Jackson against the Texans and the Rams with, and if Ronnie Stanley is not going to be out there, that's like a bad offensive line, bad quarterback against elite defensive fronts. The ranking is going to be shockingly low, I think.

But then after the bye week, you did get two games against the Bears and the Dolphins. So, like, let's hit that streak really good.

But if they're one and five, I know, coming out of the bye week, the pressure is on. The playoffs start in in week eight for them if that's the. But at the same again, the AFC North, though, Hayden, it's not like we are in the, I know, AFC North of four years ago.

It, it is what it is.

But then we're they're going to be potentially a wild card team. They're have to go into Buffalo and into Kansas City to kind of survive here. You know, it's, I mean, they're not going to give up, is what I'm saying. Like, this, all these guys are going to come back at some point, and there's going to be a section of the season that we see this Ravens offense get back to what they were, you know, in, what, like week one or week two of the season? You know, in week one, they they looked like the best offense in the league in terms of running over the Buffalo Bills.

They did, but since then they've lost like seven of their best players.

I hear you. Okay, let's talk about the Kansas City Chiefs. The number one topic is Xavier Worthy, who returned in a big way off of that shoulder injury. Uh, and immediately they got him involved. He was doing, you know, full formation motions into a 37-yard vertical shot. They were getting him backfield swings. They're getting him rub and pick routes at the second level on top of it. I believe Patrick Mahomes threw four 20-plus yard passes in his direction. One of them hit, which is great. The other three did not, but this shows that Xavier Worthy, they need him and he is fully back, and they plan to truly make him the focal point of the passing game.

Yeah, after removing the first game of the season where we only played three plays, uh, this last week, his expected points were equivalent to wide receiver 15. And he did not do that as a full-time player. He played like 68% of the plays. It was just 31% uh whenever he was out there, he was getting a target, and then he was also adding the rushing component. I thought he looked pretty dang impressive. The offense just felt way better. I think like having Kadarius Toney and Marquez Valdes-Scantling, like not great players, but versus like the Justin Watson's and the DeAndre Hopkins and the Sammy Watkins for the last couple years, you're at least like, oh, I might get beaten over the top by Patrick Mahomes. I think is playing very good football still. So, this offense, I think this team looks really good on offense, and I think that we're going to have some pretty dope Patrick Mahomes fantasy numbers moving forward. And then until we get Rashee Rice back, I do think that Xavier Worthy is going to be a fantastic play, uh, maybe even inside my top 15, uh, this next week if they can promise me a couple more snaps.

Right now, Patrick Mahomes is the quarterback three on the season, and yeah, the Worthy/Rashee Rice combo should be very fun because we really didn't get that at all last year when the two are who they are. You know, Rashee Rice opened last season on a tear, but they were trying to figure out what Xavier Worthy is, how he incorporates in the offense. He was trying to figure out the physicality and the speed of the NFL on top of it. So, once we get that in week seven moving forward, uh, this is a really dynamic passing attack. And the rushing attack still sucks.

Yeah, they can't run the ball at all. It doesn't matter who they get in there. Uh, Pacheco left wide open the pass game like in the red zone, but yeah, and then Kareem Hunt at the goal line. It's, it's a committee. You can't do anything back there. But the Chiefs are eighth in wide receiver usage this season, and that's even without Worthy and Rice out there. So, like, once we get these guys back in here, the the ceiling is very, very, very high.

Okay, last one of the top 10. Let's talk Cleveland Browns. According to Matt Zinn of CBS Sports, Dillon Gabriel is expected to start here in week five and take over for Joe Flacco. I don't think we have that confirmed as of the time of recording, but we'll just roll with it in that direction. Uh, Hayden, what is fascinating about this team is that Quinshawn Judkins continues to produce and how they are utilizing him in ways that other teams wouldn't when down by 14, 17, 24 points, is very notable to me because in many other situations when teams go by double digits or even 20-plus points, uh, they will spread everything out, only throw the football, try to hurry it up and have these, you know, no-huddle drives in garbage time. The Browns are still trotting 12 personnel out there with two tight ends. They're even moving their wide receiver into the formation to basically make him a third tight end on the end of the line. And they're just running Quinshawn Judkins even when down again 14 and 17 points. And that allows someone on, uh, arguably the worst, if not one of the worst teams in the NFL, to still get 20-plus opportunities despite your team losing by so many points.

Yeah, I think that's part of it's like the evaluation mode. Like they're trying to look and learn from, could they trust Harold Fannon the run blocker? Could they trust Quinshawn Judkins as a bell cow? And like late in that game, Aidan Hutchinson had him like fully wrapped up, and he does like a little spin move, gets out of it, and turns for a first down. So, like, every single game, there's been one of the best runs of the week has belonged to Quinshawn Judkins, and this is not a good offensive line that he's running behind. So, extremely impressive stuff from him. From their first-round defensive tackle, Carson Swensinger, their their second-rounder that was drafted right next to to Quinshawn, have all been excellent. And then Harold Fannon is making one-on-one plays in the pass game. That the ground game stuff is a little bit work in progress there. But he beat Brian Branch over the middle as well, and he's always a pain in the ass to tackle. So, like, this rookie class looks really good. And that's before we get to evaluate Dillon Gabriel. Um, and then Isaiah Bond, he was also out there after Cedric Tillman left. He was like the next guy up, and like they got him for for free, obviously. Um, but he's like going to be another rookie that's going to be eating up a ton of snaps.

Yeah. So Cedric Tillman dealing with an injury, placed on injured reserve. Uh, I believe Isaiah Bond pops in there for like 55 or 60% of snaps. Their other wide receiver, Krip, was like Jamari Thrash. Did I make that up?

Yeah. Yeah. No, that's him.

So, it seemed like even two weeks ago, they wanted to get Bond a bit more involved. Like, he was eating to Tillman's snaps, just a little bit. Uh, again, if they are in full evaluation mode, then I would assume that they want to play a rookie wide receiver as as much as possible. Um, he had six targets, three catches, 58 yards. He won on a vertical route versus single high in this game as well. So, we will see. Uh, I mean, this passing game has been quite brutal to watch with Joe Flacco at the helm. Dylan Gabriel is a different styling of passer that to me, Hayden, is going to get the ball out quick, point-and-shoot passer that might be more, you know, targets closer to the line of scrimmage or in that, let's say, two to 10-yard range. Um, I'm not sure if the success rate of it will change, but if, again, like the mentality does shift of, hey, it doesn't matter if we're down by so many points, we're going to hand the football off to Quinshawn Judkins because that's where we're at our best right now, then that truly. And I think Judkins has been awesome. And he, you know, presses line of scrimmage and the way he cuts outside and then attacks a cornerback on his inside shoulder, right off tackle, has been really fun stuff. But again, if they want to evaluate Dillon Gabriel in this, it wouldn't surprise me if they, you know, shift some of those garbage time plays into more passes versus runs.

Yeah, I can see it all. I, I think Judkins is like so firmly a fantasy starter, two at the worst. And then I think Harold Fannon's like keeping the dream alive. He's he's the tight end seven and David Njoku's numbers keep going down. So I wonder if David Njoku is going to be a trade target. I think by over the next couple weeks, it's going to be like an entire rookie offense, which we should expect some brutal performances out of that, but, um, I kind of get it, just like soft tanking, believing into your your draft class before you find the quarterback of the future, probably at next year's draft.

Right. They face the Minnesota Vikings this week, and that is across the pond in London for your first start for Dillon Gabriel. But then after that, it's the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Miami Dolphins. Like me saying that stuff about garbage time, they could also just be a better offense. Like that is possible here with Gabriel, even if I don't think he's an NFL starting caliber player. Um, but in the end, like, there's going to be conversation this week on whatever chat show you look at where, oh, why is Shedeur Sanders not playing? I can't believe it's Dillon Gabriel. I would not waste your breath with that stuff because neither of these guys are going to be the starting quarterback in 2026. Like, yeah, it's just Dillon Gabriel is going to be the long-term backup for this team. And they are playing him to get him reps now, and then a new starter comes in next year. And so why have these massive conversations of Shedeur versus Dillon Gabriel in my opinion.

I'm rooting for Dillon Gabriel big time because I played, uh, Underdog season-long pick'em. I had the lower on Joe Flacco at five and a half, so we got that one in there. And then lower on Shedeur Sanders at two and a half. So I need Dillon Gabriel to to play in there. And if I'm being truthful, um, that was more of a Kenny Pickett discussion, um, and thought process from me, and I think that Dillon Gabriel's going to come bail me out.

Yeah. You also had a Jake Haener. Uh, why was he in the lobby? I mean, is he even in the league? I don't know.

He was getting starting snaps and and a couple days in training camp. Just nuts stuff. Yeah.

I don't even think he's on the roster anymore.

Well, he's best quarterback three. Yeah, that's funny.

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Let's talk about the Arizona Cardinals. The full focus was on Trey Benson, who took over as the lead running back for the injured James Conner. Uh, I think based on everyone's reactions to an island game, Hayden, they expected Trey Benson to play 80% of snaps, and to me, that is outlandish. And some of that was game script related. But if Trey Benson, who when attached to James Conner had the passing down, two-minute, four-minute drill stuff, it's only natural and obvious to me that he was going to lose it when his backups are Keaontay Ingram and Michael Carter, because that's all that they can do. They're not going to take first down away from James Conner. They're going to take third down away from Trey Benson.

Yeah, I think that's totally fair. And we see that, uh, especially in the last like quarter of the game when they were definitely trailing, it was a lot more Ingram. That hurt the Trey Benson stuff. I think he's not getting the James Conner plus Trey Benson role, he's just getting the James Conner role and maybe a little bit more than that. Um, and he's not going to face the Seattle Seahawks, uh, with his left tackle like barely able to suit up in this one. So, uh, better days are ahead for Trey Benson. I don't think that he's going to be a top 12 running back. I think that the Cardinals are missing their run game coordinator who's now showing off with Javonte Williams in Dallas. Um, and the offensive line's just not very good in general. So Trey Benson, I think that rest of the season, he's the RB 16 to 20, which I think is totally fine if he just went crazy on on the waiver wire. Better days are ahead. I think predictably a down week against the Seattle Seahawks front seven. Um, and yeah, maybe I'm not sure if like people had too high of expectations just in general, but, um, 8.7 expected half PPR points in week one or his first game as a starter will probably be somewhere close to a season low for him. So better days are ahead. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, he played, like I said, 55% of snaps, but he's going to flirt with some top 12 weeks, like against the Tennessee Titans this week. He could easily be ranked. Wouldn't surprise me at all in the running back rankings tomorrow if he's top 12 for you. Like, that team has been run through. They don't score a lot of points. When they're not trailing in the fourth quarter or the final drive, and that's when Keaontay Ingram gets his receiving touchdown, then that could just be Trey Benson closing it out with six or seven straight runs to end it. So, again, I do not love the Trey Benson profile. I think it's very different than James Conner in terms of he is better off tackle on the edge versus the James Conner hammer stuff between the tackles and picking up the tough yards, but it doesn't necessarily matter because there's going to be games where he gets 20 touches.

Uh, other note I have from the Cardinals, they they're dealing with so many injuries in the secondary. I think that that defense is going to show some fight, but they're just not going to be good enough. And I think that Trey McBride, Marvin Harrison are like underrated winners over the last couple weeks. Trey McBride, the last two games without James Conner and the defense regressing at 14.8 and 13.9 expected fantasy points. That is by far the most in the NFL if that little mini trend continues. And then Marvin Harrison, while trailing at a season-high 13.7 expected half PPR points. So compared to last year, if this team can't run the ball as effectively, which is kind of what I'm going with, I think out of necessity, they're going to have to pass the ball a little bit more this year than they did the previous year. So, I think like the bottom was in for Marvin Harrison when I looked at the pick'em lobby and he had the same exact receiving yardage as Cooper Kupp. Um, and I think that Trey McBride's about to completely take off as well. So, I think both of those guys look better now than they did, uh, even in week one.

Yeah, Trey McBride, the tight end six at this moment. Uh, and not he's not scoring like you need a round two, three player to do it at the tight end position. He's kind of among the grouping at seven overall fantasy points. And, you know, the top tight end is getting about nine and a half, which is very different than when we were taking, you know, round one, round two tight ends when they were scoring 14, 13, 12 on a weekly basis.

I mean, Gronk and those guys is like 15, 17, 18, you know, nutso stuff. But I, I do think that Trey McBride, I think the rest of the season will look better than September. Um, I, I feel very confident in that.

And his target share is about 6% higher than Marvin Harrison Jr.'s. Like, he is easily the top target. The thing with Marv to me, he's not separating any differently than he did last year. He's very much the same player. So if you are a technician who, you know, is going to win in close range of a quarterback, you have to catch everything. He didn't early on, and then he did towards the end in terms of that red zone touchdown, which is great. Like felt awesome for him when he did it. But often times you see breakouts and second-year wide receivers take the next step and take the next leap. For him, he just has to again be perfect in the elements he can control. Uh, I just don't see a different player who did take the next leap in terms of like an individual explosive guy or separator at this point.

I see the same thing on film. I just think that the environment for fantasy points is better this year because the ground game defense looks a little bit worse, and he's at least moving around the formation a little bit more, giving him an extra screen or two per month, which is not nothing. Um, I think he's the wide receiver 24. I think I was hoping you were not going to ask.

Better than he was last year?

For sure. Like Jamar Chase versus Marvin Harrison, I thought that you were going to hit me with one of those. I think that would have been an interesting discussion. Um, so I don't think he's going to live up to that early round three capital, but I don't think he's going to be like the guy, the reason why you didn't make the fantasy playoff, anything like that.

Atlanta Falcons. So, there was plenty of freakout about Drake London prior to last week. We spent a good portion of the show on it. And if you drafted Drake London, you should thank us because I think Zac Robinson listened. Prior to the game, he had four catches for 40 yards and five targets in the slot. In week four alone, he had five receptions for 81 yards and one touchdown. Now, when you look on the stat sheet, Hayden, that says he played 44% of his snaps in the slot versus 23 and a half out wide. That might be target share.

Anyways, when you actually watch the games, it's not exactly he was stationary in the slot. More importantly, he was being put in shifts and full-speed motion at the snap. So, he was getting these free releases. He was getting, you know, space manufactured for him. Uh, and he was just able to win consistently there. So that's good. Like, you are able to put your best pass catcher in an advantageous position, and it immediately paid off. I just don't know why they weren't doing that in the first three weeks of the year.

I, I don't get why they weren't doing it, but week four looked like all of last season. And correct, Drake London is just, he's a total man. He's he's so good at the catch point. He's faster than given credit for, and he, he should not be able to cut the way that he does. Like, some of those, like the cheap motion stuff where then he runs the dig route after running full speed, being able to do that, all the motion stuff in the slot, and also that big double move up the sideline, like he's just, he's one of the best receivers in the game, and they were using him as if he was like the focal point of the offense, as they should. And it's probably a little bit helpful that Darnell Mooney is now dealing with a hamstring injury, did not finish that last game. So Drake London looked awesome. And, um, it seemed like the wide receiver coach is like taking a a huge L here. I don't know. The wide receiver coach, by the way, does not call the plays. So I don't know that they can't blame him too much here, but.

Well, the other part was Zac Robinson said he wished he had called games on the sideline versus in the booth. Yeah, before. And this was the first game he called from the sideline.

But like, you couldn't call the the cheap motion and stuff from the booth?

It, trust me, it made no sense. When I went back and looked at the stuff ahead of Sass versus film last week, I was like, "What the hell is happening here?"

I know. I know. Yeah. And they weren't throwing the ball over the middle. You had a couple more, um, plays over the middle on this one, too. So, that was that was good to see. Yeah. It was just completely night and day.

Yeah. The other thing we need to shout out is, uh, you know, they're tied at nine overall right now. That is Kyle Pitts.

And this might continue. Kyle, so far this season, Hayden, 78%, 80%, 82%, 74% snaps. And then Darnell Mooney is going to be out for a long time with, I believe, a hamstring injury.

So this is a team that dominated in three wide receiver sets last year, and Kyle Pitts was not a factor because of it. They are running about 30% fewer three wide receiver sets this year, and Kyle Pitts is being a huge beneficiary of that. And it's not just, you know, two wide receiver set stuff. He's also out there in three wide receiver set stuff, too.

Yeah, 9.2 and 8.2 expected points without Mooney. Though the two games with him, it's it's lower than that. So there's some splits occurring there. He just looks good on tape too. It's like nothing crazy like the rookie season where he was just like a go ball winner down the sideline, uh, but more burst within 20 yards. And I think eventually there'll be a couple splash plays. So I think that he's, he's passing the eye test. Him, him and Kincaid, buying, buying the dip on the third-year tight end, how about that?

Or fourth year for for Pitts, but same, same.

Feel like I've been talking about Kyle Pitts for 17 years on this show.

But when you miss a full season and he's out of my mind, he's still to me a third-year breakout. How about that?

All right, all right, all right. And then finally, Bijan Robinson is just, uh, unreal. Like when you're just watching the games, the m, the way he moves is simply outstanding. There have been obviously many amazing running back picks in the first two rounds so far. Um, you know, Jonathan Taylor's a running back two, Bijan's a running back three, CMC's the running back four. The Bijan Robinson stuff, while per game at this moment is only at 19.9, uh, I'm going to compare it to the 2017 Todd Gurley season when he went nuclear. Now, that I think that year Todd Gurley had 24 fantasy points per contest.

I mean, just nutso stuff. But the usage is quite similar in terms of these receptions out in the flats and having that be a massive part of the game plan. I think my main difference is I'm not sure who Todd Gurley's bowling ball closer was at the fourth quarters, because that is Tyler Allgeier for this team.

And look, you can complain about the Allgeier stuff all you want, guys. With if you're a Bijan manager, he just runs right through everybody's face. So I totally get it if you're the Falcons.

Okay, Buffalo Bills. This team is incredibly obvious with what they're good at and what they do. James Cook right now is the running back one overall. He continues to score touchdowns inside of the 10-yard line. He was one of the best picks in all of fantasy football this year. Uh, they only go three and out at the third lowest rate across the NFL at this moment. And then they are frustrating to play anyone else other than Josh Allen because when you look at it and how their wide, how their targets are dispersed, I should say, Keon Coleman is at 18.5%, Khalil Shakir is at 16.8%, and Dalton Kincaid at 15.1%. And that doesn't even include Josh Palmer or Dawson Knox or James Cook or even Curtis Samuel in this game.

Yeah. So wide receivers for usage, Keon Coleman, wide receiver 47, Shakir, 58, Palmer, 71. So like these guys will have, they'll have a game or two, and it's going to be completely unpredictable. Um, Khalil Shakir looked awesome on that broken tackle, and like you said, that the targets aren't good enough to play him continuously. So, it's like a better and best ball team aside from, I think Dalton Kincaid is is graduated enough. He's still not running a lot of routes, but touchdown or bust candidate, absolutely. And then yeah, James Cook has just been a monster, above 15 expected half PPR in all four outings. So he's, it's just beyond like last year's usage. Like, this is like a y, absolute league winner type.

He looks just like Devin Singletary, man. It, it's pretty amazing how how close they look alike.

Um, yeah, the Kincaid stuff, I got a question of, hey, should I start Hunter Henry or Dalton Kincaid? My answer would be, hey, which team has and is favored for more points that week? That's most likely to be the Bills, but whichever team, you know, is more likely to score a touchdown or more touchdowns, play that tight end because that's what those two guys are kind of flip-flopping in that department. And then finally here with Lamar Jackson injured for the next few weeks, Josh Allen is the clear quarterback one. I mean, right now he is 24.9 points. Uh, and then Patrick Mahomes is the next closest who is healthy at 22.4 points per game.

Yeah, it's, I don't know how you stop this offense right now.

Carolina Panthers are next. Uh, this defense next faces the Miami Dolphins. I don't know if you got to watch any of the Patriots offensive stuff, but what they were doing is tons of misdirection, and they were forcing this guy, DJ Johnson, who's a former third-round pick, to like fly up the field and running right by him. DJ Johnson is now gone. He is now cut since that game, even if he was a starter. But this team is going to get torched on there. And then offensively, Hayden, like they still have yet to play a normal game, as we talked about on Sunday night.

Yeah, it's wild. Um, with the Chuba stuff, his efficiency is down the last two games versus the two previous games. And that's like when the center and right guard are out. Rico Dowdle was actually mixing in like early in the game, which we had not seen in a little bit. So, I wonder if they're like trying to jumpstart the offense, but you can see Rico Dowdle got a little bit of a run early on.

Got a whole drive, I believe.

Yeah. And then at the very end, um, in complete just BS time, uh, they even got ETN down there. So better days are coming for Chuba Hubbard, but the team is just looking really bad. So like the the thought process of, hey, if this team is the 20th best team instead of 30th, um, it's hard to envision at this point.

I'm actually skeptical if good things are coming ahead for Chuba Hubbard. Um, you know, my show on Thursday with Faras, I've brought him up the last, I think, two weeks as a sell candidate because his production so far has been in trailing passing situations. Like, they can't run the football at this point, and that's just what he is going to be best at, at copying and pasting it on a weekly basis. And right now, if you just look across of fantasy football, I believe he's the running back 19. Uh, I'm not sure if he's going to in the running back 16. I'm not sure if he's going to finish at the running back 16 ahead of Kyren E. Jones, Derrick Henry, Cam Akers. So, like, to me, this is a sell period for him.

Yeah, I think he's like the RB 23 somewhere in that range. It's, um, and I think there's a chance that if things broke his way, he could have been a top 15 running back, but obviously things have broken the opposite of that. And then you can see in this one, this is pretty surprising, neutral pass rate, which they're never a neutral situation. This is small sample size stuff. Uh, but they're third highest, and that's I think probably a backup center, and, you know, Robert Hunt is just a mover in the run game, and not having him, I do think is like the biggest of the core issues there, too. So.

T.J. Hockenson looks good every single time I watch him. He obviously had a couple drops and near catches, which hopefully he'll get cleaned up. But every single week he has like a couple like yards after the catch plays, which is like the underrated part of him. So big days are coming from T.J. Hockenson. Um, he's one of the the only rookie, uh, players who I can like see end up being like a really good pick eventually, but major positive regression by load candidate for T.J. Hockenson. I think big days are going to come.

Yeah. And you would like to think they come against the Miami Dolphins this week. Um, but we will see. I have zero faith in the operation happening in Carolina right now.

Chicago Bears. There's a lot of good here, specifically in the second half. Uh, they were a second-half team. Uh, and it was really fun to watch and go back and go through this game. I mean, the throw that Caleb Williams made over the middle to Rome Odunze, where he threw it well before the break, and it was on an absolute line. Yep.

Uh, is absolute beautiful stuff. Uh, again, there was a lot going wrong in the first half, but they're at least one of these teams that they can be a different team in the second half. And it helped that they got, you know, three interceptions by their defense, too. It's good that the normal dropback game continues to get better and better, and the actual like root problem, um, early in the game was they were trying to do a lot with the ground game, and none of it was working. So, they're doing some fancy stuff that was just like they could not block it up. Uh, D'Andre Swift is just completely unreliable. Ball goes off of his forehead. Um, yeah, and then Caleb, when he gets out of the pocket, like sometimes it's like the highlight play, and then sometimes the ball kind of gets scattershot with him. But I thought they play in.

He tries that like torque throw all the time now when on the, instead of just like picking up a couple yards, he's like, I'm going to fit this in the tightest window. Throw it as hard as I can. And it's like, just pick up four yards on the scramble instead.

But it does look pretty sick. So I, I'm for it, uh, watching him.

My big takeaway from this one is I am calling the shot. Feeling super confident about this. Cole Kmet is going to matter big time as soon as he's back ready to go. He got a couple targets before that injury, and this week Cole Kmet as a blocker, catching the ball over the middle, it was it was a disaster. It was a disaster for Cole Kmet. They are desperate for better tight end play. Um, he can't block or catch. So big days are coming from Cole Kmet. So like, if he's, I'm sure that people have dropped him because we've had no production. Now it's by weeks and injuries and stuff, and I get that in a shallow league. But if you are wanting to ride this thing out, I do think that Cole Kmet is going to be one of the guys that is very much going to matter as as soon as he's back and ready to go with that hip injury.

And heck, I'll say that K.J. Hamler, after getting a ton of criticism, a ton of criticism for his pass protection, he only had one rep in this game, but he picked up an awesome blitz and allowed Caleb Williams to hit, you know, a middle of the field throw on top of it. Look, D'Andre Swift had that short-yardage rushing score, which again happens if you're playing 80% of the snaps. I just, you know, have seen Ben Johnson offenses over the last few years. He's not going to appreciate a total lack of success rushing attack the entire rest of the way. And

I'm not telling you K.J. Hamler definitely is the answer. I am saying he is a possible answer to that. And it would make sense that a seventh-round rookie needs some time in order to earn some trust moving forward. So that is, I think the next possible Woody Marks could be K.J. Hamler in terms of pick him up a couple weeks early instead of having to spend 100% of your budget as soon as that happens.

Yep. Uh, last note for me, Rome Odunze, 30% once you remove the screens, which he doesn't get that many screens. They have other guys to do that, but once you were in the normal dropback game, 30% target rate for him. So that's very, very, very promising.

Let's talk about the Detroit Lions. Uh, my only comment because you know Amon-Ra St. Brown is incredibly efficient still, and especially in the red zone and man coverage was simply amazing, and Jahmyr Gibbs is Jahmyr Gibbs. Jameson Williams, this is the first game all year that he cleared five targets. He had eight targets but only two receptions for 40 yards. Unfortunately, a lot of it was his fault. He dropped a 44-yarder when he was kind of switching shoulders. He first looked over his right shoulder, the pass was to his left. Boom. Bread basket. Bucket catch drop. And then he had dropped another 12-yarder, again, in a very similar fashion. So, it sucks. We keep asking for, you know, more volume, at least I do, in the direction of Jameson Williams. He got it in this game, and it didn't work out.

Yeah, if you look at the change in average depth of target year-over-year, if you see a name way up top on this chart, that's Jameson Williams, who's currently at 21.4 a dot down the field. So there's, he's like the guy that I struggle with rankings the most because one week he he'll finish as the wide receiver six, in a week like maybe even next week, but I can't rank him very high because the consistency is just like so bad. So like on the season, if you're averaging it out, Jameson Williams is the wide receiver 50 in usage. He's obviously going to be performing better than my model because he's a good player in a good offense. But he's one of these guys that there's no gimmies right now, um, for J. I have this theory heading into this season that one, Ben Johnson and a different coordinator, they might change how they utilize Jameson Williams because of what Jameson Williams' profile was prior to 2024 as that vertical burner. Mhm. But then the other part was last season, Sam LaPorta was dealing with 17 different injuries, and they kind of gave his targets to Jameson Williams in terms of these crossers, delayed routes, these types of things that got him at full speed, and then he was able to run after the catch. So, yeah, I mean, 2024, a lot of it was transformed for Jameson Williams. He wasn't just a vertical go-ball guy, and he was more, hey, let's manufacture the space and have Jameson run into it, and then.

He can just run away with the ball, and we're not getting that stuff this year, and that's definitely going to hurt the consistency, obviously.

And the Lions are 31st in neutral run rate or neutral pass rate. There's running the ball a ton, and then they're also leading by a lot. So you don't get as many fourth-quarter, uh, receptions. Um, so even with like Sam LaPorta, that's three straight games where he's under six and a half expected fantasy points. The week one Chase Claypool, where they, uh, adopted for Jared was like two yards down the field. He cleaned up there, but ever since then, like he's not a part of the offense. It's Amon-Ra St. Brown, the two running backs, and then a couple of shot plays to these guys. Um, so if they're going to be kicking everyone's ass and they're scoring 27 points instead of the 35-40s, um, then those two guys, I think, are going to like lose at the margins.

Now, we say all these things, and they get the Cincinnati Bengals this week. So, start everybody. Maybe it's a start everyone. Yeah. Situation. And yeah, you know, when we do these shows in the summer about projected points and predicted points and all this type of stuff, we get questions of, well, why are you trusting Vegas? Uh, they are wrong all the time, blah, blah, blah. Um, this game against the Browns, when they are, you know, on the same tier, let's say, with the Green Bay Packers, to me shows why looking at projected team totals is beneficial.

Yes. This is the last time we're going to say it. In week one, this Lions team against the Packers on the road was projected for 22 points. Then an equal, maybe defense, if not better, in the Cleveland Browns. At home, the Lions were projected for 27 and a half in this game.

That's a huge difference, you know, and we saw what happened in week one. There were some questions about the OC. It turned out to be the Packers tax. And then now here we are. We can clearly say that this is going to be a very good offense once again. And I haven't looked at the totals this week, but are they going to be projected for 29 and a half against the Bengals?

I mean, I wouldn't be taking the lower. If, if they, if they were projected that high. That feels appropriate to me.

Yeah. I mean, and they don't take the foot off the gas. And I'm going 28 and 12 either.

You're going 28 and a half. Uh, it is 29 and a half. Look at me.

There you go. There you go. Look at me. Wow. All right. Next up, can't wait to talk about this. Houston Texans. Only one man here in Woody Marks. 17 carries, 69 yards, one score. Four catches, 50 yards, and one score. And he did it all on just 56% of snaps. Independently, me, you, Jacob have all talked about Woody Marks. I loved what I saw in preseason. Didn't really watch him as a prospect ahead of the NFL draft, but when he got out there in preseason action, he looked more like a well-rounded running back than just a passing down airback. And then, man, some of the cuts like diagonally and upfield he was making here. It wasn't just lateral moves. Again, it was diagonal. It was creating that space. It was at full speed.

I'm not saying that this offense is going to have true success running the football. Heck, they just traded away Cam Robinson after like signing him for some money. And it's not like the other offensive linemen have played great, but this is only, to me, going in one direction. There might be some bumps here and there, but Woody Marks is a top 24 running back the rest of the way in fantasy football. Easy. To me.

14.6 expected points this last week. Easily a season high. They gave Nick Chubb the first snaps coming out of each half, but after that, it was a bunch of Woody Marks. And this game was like not completely over at that point. So they didn't, weren't mixing in somebody else. So he's looked really good. And then just looking at Nick Chubb versus Woody Marks, Nick Chubb keeps getting, you know, tackled two, three yards down the field where Woody Marks is actually creating some explosives. And you just look at the eye test, too. It's very obvious where this one's going to. So, um, trade Nick Chubb if you can at all, and then make sure you get Woody Marks on your football team. He's going to be, he's going to be one of the best pickups, uh, of the year. He's also going to be one of the best, uh, rookie picks in baseball of the season as well. Uh, and then the Joe Mixon stuff, they, they're saying that he's probably not going to come back, uh, anytime soon, if at all. Um, so it's going to be Woody Marks, um, leading the charge.

Okay, question. And you are not responsible for your answer here. Rest of season from here on out, Trey Benson or Woody Marks, who does better?

I'll go, I'll go Trey Benson, but I think it's fairly close. Uh, I thought you were going to hit me with the, uh, Chuba Hubbard or Woody Marks. And I'll probably still go Chuba, but it's close. Like, I would have Woody Marks top 30 rest of the season. Like, Woody Marks or Tayvon Henderson. Your turn. Go.

Oh, Woody Marks or Trevon Henderson. Um, I would probably side with, with probably Woody Marks there. Yeah. But I, I think both can finish at the end of the year as, as top 24 guys. Um, we'll get to the Patriots here in a moment. I just also want to talk about the wide receiver stuff. So when Christian Kirk returned in week three, he was seeing 67% of the snaps. That also allowed Xavier Hutchinson to play 62%. That basically stayed the same, even if Jalen Higgins popped in there for a slot vertical route touchdown. He had the same snaps as he did in week three at the same time. So we haven't seen, again, despite the production being there, an overtaking of Higgins and Null instead of Hutchinson and Kirk at this point.

Yeah. Full, full rotation back there. So Christian Kirk threw two games, wide receiver 53 in usage. He's, he's a bench guy only. All those guys are. Um, the pass game was, they had a couple explosive plays like Nico Collins went right by, uh, Legius Sneed, which was good to see. Uh, and then obviously Higgins won that one-on-one, um, in the slot for, for a touchdown. But there wasn't like, this was not like a, a brand new offense and like, "Wow, look at all this stuff." They changed up the ground game a little bit, and Woody Marks had some comments after that. Uh, but the pass game offense still, to me, looks pretty messy, and I think that was more of a Tennessee Titans secondary stat. Um, there was a couple just pass protection errors where like, I can't even explain the direction any of the offensive linemen were were going to.

And we're saying all this stuff after the Titans game, which is the worst team in the NFL at this point. Yeah. Uh, and they're not going to be facing the worst team. They get them again, but not immediately. Now, they do get the Baltimore Ravens this week, and their defense has been decimated. Even it's still probably better than this Titan one. I will, I think it is. Now, after that, it gets tough. It's the Seahawks, the 49ers, the Broncos, and the Jaguars in a four-game stretch after that. So, again, I don't just want to take, oh, we got this Woody Marks week. We're definitely going to get that every single time moving forward. And to be honest, the same stuff with like Nico Collins. He is not. You know, you and I both thought that in a good situation, Nico Collins could be a top three, top four producer at the wide receiver position this year. It's not even close to that at this point. And I, I can't tell you what they need to change other than the entire thing in order for him to like be able to be totally spotlight and highlighted with all of his talent.

Right. Uh, there's two charts I want to hit on for the Texans. Deep targets, just anything beyond 15 air yards. Right now, the Texans are bottom three next to the, uh, bottom four next to the Steelers, Eagles, and Jets. Like, not a very good spot to be on. And then I posted the other one on Twitter, which is deep targets, which are kind of like, I think 10 air yards, but over the middle. In a couple seasons ago, when Tank Dell and Nico Collins were rocking, they were an outlier.

They were. Don't you dare. Uh.

I'm serious. I'll just say good Larry Munoz. How about that? Uh.

Okay. When they had Tank Dell, all those guys rolling, the Texans were like by themselves up in the top right quadrant. Now they're with the worst teams in the NFL on the bottom left. If you cannot throw the ball consistently over the middle and into the intermediate deep part of the game, you have no chance at being a legit offense in the NFL. It's by far the most effective play. Looking at EPA, if you're watching the game, big dig routes, post routes, seam routes, all that type of stuff, sitting in zone coverage. If you can't do that in the NFL, you just are not an NFL playoff caliber offense. And that's where the Texans are. So, I, I want more dig routes to, to Nico Collins, post routes. I need more of that type of stuff before I can like start treating the Texans like as some like super serious, uh, team for the playoffs.

Yeah. Listen, I'm not saying that Bobby Slowik did not deserve to be fired. I am saying go back and watch that first season when he was calling plays with, as you said, Nico Collins, Tank Dell, and heck, even Noah Brown.

And what you saw was seven-man protections with two tight ends or an extra fullback.

Yeah. They had a great pass protection plan, and it was just crossing routes, scissor routes, stuff like that. And CJ could just hit his back foot and rip that stuff, and that is just all gone. And those were wide open constantly every time. Condensed splits, we do here, and then we attack on the edge. That's all gone. So, I was excited for Nick Caley. I cannot tell you what a Nick Caley offense is right now. Just can't do it.

Yeah. Yeah. They're trying to figure it out. Um, yeah. I miss the, the blocking it up, and it's just dig routes, comeback routes, and stuff. It was just like automatic.

Man. Speaking of automatic, let's go to the Indianapolis Colts. Uh, if this is like a bad or average performance for the Colts, sign me the f up. And it really might be because, you know, Daniel Jones was getting pressured. He had the sixth highest pressure rate here in week four. And he still completed versus pressure 12 of 14 passes for 181 yards and a score. Uh, that's a new quarterback. That's a guy that has answers. That's a guy who's trusting all of his elements out there. He got banged up, and it still looked good. Now, the issue with that, Hayden, is this is an issue, but it's Jonathan Taylor. It's Tyler Warren. It's Michael Pittman, and a guy that we think is really talented, and Josh Downs, is the wide receiver 74 on the season. So this is peak Colts, and Josh Downs is still wide receiver 74.

Yeah. I hate to say that he's droppable, but in like a shallower league, he definitely is droppable. So the Michael Pittman stuff's been electric. There's some splits without, uh, Alec Pierce. I don't truly believe in those, but Michael Pittman's a focal point. He looks healthy. He looks good. Um, and then Tyler Warren, he had 14.1 expected half PPR points, uh, getting that goal-line carry. And that's the first game where they were actually in trail mode. So we're going to see some, I think, better games out of Tyler Warren than the first three weeks. Um, just because they're not going to be beating everybody by by a bunch, but yeah. No, this is a, a very just well-thought-out offense. Um, and Daniel Jones is just like sliding in the pocket and hitting some big boy throws. So, um, yeah, man. Like, super impressed.

Super impressed. Uh, this team is just really fun to watch on a weekly basis. It's one of the first teams that I boot up every single Monday morning because I want to see what Shane Steichen and company, uh, are doing. Anything else you want to add on this team other than, you know, Jonathan Taylor being the running back two overall at this point with nearly 21 points per game?

Yeah, I, I guess it would just be like, kind of circling back to Michael Pittman. I feel like people are not appreciating what he's going to do this season. If you just like look at the Gardner Minshew year and then where he's at right now, and then even the beginning before he threw out his back, uh, last year, like the numbers are very, very solid. So another USC Trojan that probably belongs in the top 30 in fantasy rankings.

And the other thing I'll say is if you are out there and you drafted two tight ends and like Tyler Warren was your first, and or you picked up Juwan Johnson, or you picked up Hunter Henry, or you have John Koncinsky, look to sell those other guys high right now. I'm not saying they're going to go down, but you just shouldn't have two tight ends of this caliber that are top four. Uh, to me, that's like a perfect time to go and get someone else at a running back or wide receiver spot.

Jacksonville Jaguars. Hey, is it time for Liam Cohen to pick a side for Travis Hunter?

Um, probably. But like, if you're going to pick a side, and it's just like, now he's just your full-time slot wide receiver because he doesn't know the rest of the playbook on offense. Like, is that really helping out either? Like, to me, what we got from this game for for Travis was just that wow play and the reminder of like what he's capable of like when he's not just a, you know, Cole Beasley's like choice route merchant. Like more post routes is like, even if he's like only knows the playbook from the slot, give me more of those. Like, I, I want all the fun stuff down the field with Travis Hunter. So, um, he's played 100% of the three-wide receiver sets, and then he played 0% of the others. And that's exactly what Liam Cohen said, uh, is the situation with him. So it doesn't matter, like for fantasy purposes right now, until something changes. Like, you can't, there's only a couple wide receivers that don't play in two-wide receiver sets that are fantasy relevant. So we are stuck with Travis Hunter, but it was a good reminder that he can go up and make some sick plays at the catch point. Um, so we'll see.

What you're referring to is a 28-yard, third-and-15 from their own goal line, and he just climbs the ladder and he goes up and gets it. Now, he had another reception that he fumbled a bit later on. I guess my point is this. He played eight defensive snaps on the opening drive. Then he played one more on the next series, which was a third-and-two reception that he allowed in man-to-man coverage versus Ricky Pearsall. And then didn't play a single defensive snap in the final three quarters.

Yeah. Meanwhile, he only played 38 of 68 offensive snaps. And I get if those are only in the slot, and he's playing nearly 100% of those. The issue with that is the Jaguars are 11th in three-wide receiver sets at 68% of the time. So then that leads me to a question of, is a guy who's playing 38 of 68 offensive snaps and then nine defensive snaps, is that worth two first-round picks and a second-round pick?

The answer is no.

It's not. Like, even if it was Amon-Ra St. Brown as the slot wide receiver, that's a lot for someone like Amon-Ra St. Brown who plays in two-wide receiver sets, even though he's a slot player. So, like, at some point, they have to get him involved. Either as a full-time, like, if he was 65% snaps on both sides of the ball and he was awesome at it, I think that would potentially be worth it, but you can't do 25% of defensive snaps and then only play in the slot and expect to like change the outcome of games. And like you said, the slot stuff, he's made a couple plays on the ball, but he, he's also allowing some receptions underneath, and he's missed a couple tackles, and I think he had like one highlight block in this last game, but on offense, I've also thought that he's been a liability in the blocking department, too. And then obviously the, the pre-snap, uh, illegal plays as well. So, for a team that spoke every time they got on a microphone and were asked about that, "Oh, we have a great plan for him. The plan's going to be fantastic." I don't know what the plan is. You know, it feels like they've already changed the plan through four weeks where he played offense in week one, then they had some, you know, cornerback injuries, and so he played more cornerback. They had really good matchups, uh, in terms of difficult wide receivers that they faced. But then in this one, how do you play eight defensive snaps and then just one more, and then you don't play more defense, and then you're only playing 38 of 68 on offense? Like, at some point, they have to get their money's worth, and I understand if that's going to be sophomore year, his third year, all that type of stuff. But to trade all of that, you need to get an impact in your rookie season, in year one. And there's plenty of season to go, and to me, he's plenty talented for it to work. But through four weeks, as much as I like Travis Hunter, that trade is not even close to being paid off at this moment.

Yeah. No, definitely not. I do think the defensive snap thing, like, if you want to try to make a prediction, is it just like when they have really good wide receivers on the other team, he's just going to play more corner because it's like they changed their mind after nine snaps in this game.

Yeah, I don't know. They had that weird quote after the game, too. So I think they're, they're trying to figure this whole thing out. But Liam Cohen told us like, he is a slot wide receiver on offense, and that's what it's been, you know? So like the only kind of question mark right now is how many snaps is he playing on defense in addition to the slot-only stuff, because we have not seen him out in two-wide receiver sets yet. So, and then to me, if he only focused on slot wide receiver, just to go back to this point, then that's still not enough.

No. If he only plays wide receiver, which I would love for him to only play wide receiver.

He needs to be out there in two-wide receiver sets. It's pretty easy.

Yeah. I wish they would have just drafted him at wide receiver, and he has to learn the entire offensive playbook, and then he'll play a couple snaps at corner, and like that would have been fun. And then sophomore year, now he's playing 25% of the corner snaps. That's what I wanted this to happen. It's not.

But even that idea almost went that way in this game where, again, he played the first series, but then he didn't check in on the second series on defense until third-and-two. They ask him to go out there and match up against Ricky Pearsall, and Ricky Pearsall routes him up on a stop route, and then he allows a first down, and they take him out. So, like, to me, it's probably really tough for a guy to focus on offense. I'm not saying he is, but theoretically, someone to focus on offense, and then, oh, go out there on third downs because that was a discussion point this summer, and then go play against their top corner when you're cold on that side, and then not give up a reception for a first down, as he just did in this game. And I'll say this, Jacksonville's defense has been elite. So maybe just say, "We got enough dudes. We hit on the Deon Lloyd, who's played out of his mind. Jordan Lewis has been great. Tyson Campbell's been great. Got two edge rushers." "F it. We need some help on that wide receiver."

That's what I'm saying. Because the wide receiver stuff is the most questionable aspect of everything. As we talked about on Sunday night, they still aren't lining up properly. They're still being late to the football. They are still getting false starts or delay of games, and they are still getting legal shifts. It was very notable to me. Again, the Brian Thomas Jr. usage is still very high. It is wide receiver 12 in expected points according to your models. Once again, that is not a Shane Waldron issue. It's a Brian Thomas Jr. catching the football issue that he's wide receiver 45 or whatever it is at this point. They did ask him to only run basically outside-breaking routes or all his targets were there instead of working in the trash in the middle of the field. And that stood out to me when going back and watching this game. My Brian Thomas note for this week. He's had one screen pass this year, and I think that was the screen where he and Travis Hunter both tried to block. So I guess I think they were trying to call that a Brian Thomas screen because they did not catch it. Last year he had 18 receptions and on 18 targets in the screen department. We have not seen that. And that matters only a little bit. Like there's getting him like on end-around stuff, but like that's one area where if you wanted to get Brian Thomas some free receptions, get his confidence back up, maybe throw him a couple screens. But as we saw with Liam Cohen last year with the Bucs, the screens are going to the backs, which have been awesome. Like, anyone complaining about the Bijan Robinson and Travis Etienne production, nobody is. And then Travis Hunter, he's also getting a bunch of screens because he he barely knows the playbook, and like that's the one thing that he might be able to do. So, we're getting squeezed on the Brian Thomas screen reception. But, yeah, he's just needs to catch the ball, and then there'll be a couple games, just man coverage, crossing route, go ball, step where you're gonna get your huge explosives. But yeah, they're, they're, they're working through this. Like you said, I like the idea 100% wide receiver snaps and let the other defensive players just continue to win football games.

It seems kind of simple. Uh, and yet we're not in the building, so we can't say it. I mean, yeah, Parker Washington played 85% of snaps last week, and you didn't spend two first-rounders and a second-round pick to go and get Parker Washington. Meanwhile, Travis Hunter's at 58, 56. I understand again that he's only learning slot, but like, just to dial this back and rewind, was it best for him to only learn slot? That's the question here.

Yeah. Yeah. When, by the way, he played outside last year for Colorado.

Yep. I know. I don't know. It's frustrating. And they're, and by the way, they're all three in one. I'm sure the comments are like, "They're three in one. Like, oh, look at all these fantasy nerds like nitpicking everything." It's said, "Well, right, like you're not going to have 19 interceptions."

Correct. 19 turnovers through four games.

It's wild. Is I think they only had eight turnovers all of last year or something like that. It's nuts. Uh, final note I had is the other question that we had for this team. It's so funny that the questions we had for them on the defense and all that stuff, they're turning out to be the strengths. The rushing game, and specifically the offensive line has been just amazing when it comes to run blocking. Travis Etienne is second in the NFL with 2.1 yards before contact so far. And giving him these runways, and obviously his vision to get those runways too, is a huge win, uh, right now for this rushing team.

Yeah. Um, that little move that he made at the second level was was.

Yeah. Yeah. He's. Travis Etienne is, he's, he looks really good right now. Like, I don't know what else to say. He looks like he did in his first couple seasons before last year when he was dealing with that hamstring injury.

Okay, let's go to the Las Vegas Raiders. Speaking of giving your running back room to run, Austin Ekeler finally got just a little bit. Again, prior to week four, he was averaging negative .1 yards before contact. In week four, when he went for over 100 yards and multiple, multiple touchdowns, he was given .7 yards of contact. Now, I really hope that that wasn't just a one-week wonder, but it might be. Not because of Austin Ekeler. He's an electric individual talent, but they just placed Kolton Miller, their left tackle that they gave a bump to this offseason, on injured reserve with at least a high ankle sprain and maybe more injuries on top of that. So, if you look at many, and I mean many of the best Austin Ekeler runs, they were off that left side. So, while again, there's no issues I have with Austin Ekeler as an individual, this does make me concerned that we'll have a few more performances like the opening three weeks ahead.

Yeah, he, I mean, he was still getting smacked behind the line of scrimmage on most of his runs this last game. He just had like the one that there was some space and he made the most out of it, obviously. So, collectively, they're 25th in running back usage. Um, he played, uh, a little bit more in the pass game, and he caught both of his passes for touchdowns. So like, obviously that's really helpful from that, but that's not like super sticky. Um, so yeah, the Kolton Miller stuff, that's a big deal because like that was like the one guy from like the offseason they're like, "We have our left tackle. We're learning about DJ Glaze at right tackle. We've got three different options, none of them good, obviously. And in the interior, we're going to figure this thing out." Like, all of a sudden now, there goes like the one guy that you can count on. And on top of that, like, I'll take a huge Geno Smith. Like, I don't know what the hell's happening this year. Like, he's just throwing the ball into harm's way multiple times.

He targeted Jakobi Meyers in all three interceptions. Like, one of them was a great play, but he, he just like isn't anticipating how quick Kevin Byard is at closing passes. I don't know.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there was like, if you want to like really kind of nitpick some of them, like there was some like, "What the hell is that safety even doing over there? That's like not even his responsibilities." But then the other one, the crossing route, was just, he just missed through it. So, and obviously he's going to be dealing with, you know, out the left tackle. So, like the Raiders have been explosive through the air, and like that's how they've hung in there. The down-to-down consistency is like not there. They've had like some chunk plays through the air mixing with some interceptions mixing with the lone Austin Ekeler stuff. So, this is, this is going to be one of the worst offenses in the league, you know, like it's without, without Kolton Miller, like they, they really need to get Brock Bowers like up to speed, and maybe he's the answer to like calm everything down as like more underneath stuff to, to Brock Bowers as his knee starts to feel a little bit better. But yeah, the Kolton Miller stuff, that's a big deal.

Okay, let's talk about Brock Bowers because at this point last year, he was the tight end four in points per game with 8.2 through four weeks. This year, he is much lower than the tight end four. He is the tight end 13 at also 8.5 points per game. So there are some differences when you look at the underlying metrics in terms of the Raiders with Chip Kelly are throwing it six fewer times per game than the Raiders did all of last season. And then also his target share because you have Jakobi Meyers, because you have running backs, because you know you have Trey Tucker has dropped, I think about like 12%. And those really add up on top of the quarterback being Geno Smith and wanting to throw the football down the field.

Yeah. And to me, this is the biggest thing versus Aidan O'Connell, who didn't want to throw the football beyond eight yards last year.

Yeah. That's always been in the back of my mind with the Brock Bowers step is Gino is an upgrade for the offense and like how many yards and not even yards, just like how many points you're expected to score. But he's just going to get there in like different ways, and that kind of explains what Trey Tucker's done. So things will get better. Like the bottom is in for Brock Bowers. Like he's clearly been playing through through an injury, and yeah, that will get better each and every week, I hope. Um, but yeah, like the Raiders, I think last year were like top five in completions as a team. Like they were throwing the ball a ton in garbage time to Brock Bowers relentlessly. And I think this offense is not going to be as focused as that. Now, I do think if the Brock Bowers team is one and three, zero and four, I would be like trying to trade for him. And I, I would still rank him as the tight end two for the rest of the season, uh, very easily. Um, but at the second-round value, I wouldn't pay a second-round value price tag. I would draft him 36th overall. Um, if drafts are happening today.

Yeah, I totally misspoke on the scoring stuff before, by the way. Hunter Henry's at like 11 and a half. Jake Ferguson's at 11.3 versus the guys that were at 14.5 previously.

Okay, LA Chargers. More injuries. Joe Alt out for weeks at left tackle. Uh, Justin Herbert was getting beaten up in the pocket. And Hayden, how did Greg Roman respond? By throwing the football more than ever.

Double down. Double down. We're just going to keep throwing the ball. I looked into that because they're easily number one in neutral pass rate. That's held the entire season, but we're talking about like outlier stuff at this point. I was like, "Oh, maybe they're like throwing a bunch of screens and stuff." Nope. Few amount of screens in the league. So, it's all on Justin Herbert now, behind one of the worst offensive lines, easily without both their left tackle and right tackle. Um, I mean, it's all on Justin Herbert. It makes me nervous about like his health and stuff moving forward. Now, he, he's so dang good that I think that they're gonna be still be able to move the move the ball, but, um, yeah, it's, if Kolton Miller is a big deal, Joe Alt, even a bigger deal. Does this make you want to ding expectations for an incredible duo that we have so far in Quentin Johnston as the wide receiver four overall, Keenan Allen as the wide receiver 14 overall, and then Ladd McConkey. You got to scroll all the way down. I can't even find him at this point.

Wide receiver 54. As the wide receiver 62 overall.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yes, my answer is I'm lowering expectations without Joe Alt for this offense. Um, and with the Ladd McConkey stuff, I went back and just watched him this last week. He's just not as good as he was last year. I hate for it to be as simple as that. But there were multiple plays that he could have made. He had, like, you can count three drops from this last game. Um, and unfortunately, like the interception, like that was going to be a rub route for him, and he and I think it was Tyler Conklin collide, and then all of a sudden, you know, like all those things were just open for Ladd McConkey, and he was catching everything. Um, he still looks really fast, and I think that he's a great route runner still, but, um, the catch point stuff has been a little bit worse than usual. And I also think that all those like dig routes that he was winning on last year, well, now you have Keenan Allen in the zone over there, you're getting more Quentin Johnston post routes and stuff, so I think you're losing at the margins in terms of target share, then he just like has not played as well through four weeks. And like that could easily turn around the rest of the season, but like I think it was fair to say that he was dominant on tape last year, and then this year he's been very average.

What we talk about like progression is not linear for these young guys. You know, there's going to be some dips down at some point, and then they'll go back up on the upward trend. Uh, and then we talk about with Ladd, tight red zone, red zone stuff, that's just not his area, and it hasn't been. He's just not going to get as many red zone targets or end zone targets as Quentin Johnston or Keenan Allen. I will add again, these things can shift. It's the Washington Commanders defense and then the Miami Dolphins defense the next two weeks. So again, things change like this in fantasy football. You are right until you're wrong, and you're wrong until you're right. And, uh, these types of games can change narratives quite quickly.

Yep. And then for Quentin Johnston, real quick, that's 24% targets, and like they're downfield and in the end zone for a lot of them. So he's as real as it gets.

Yep. Uh, I just wanted to bring up for the Chargers. Sam Hopp has a great, um, chart. And I'm sure Weeves is putting it on there. Yeah, Quentin Johnston's at 25%. Keenan's at 24.3, and then Ladd McConkey is at like 18.8 in terms of target share. So, okay. Next up is the LA Rams. Really good football team. Uh, I'm not sure if there's any more to add other than this same chart from Sam Hopp. Puka Nacua has a ridiculous 37.6% target share, which, you know, it's why he's the wide receiver one on top of just being an incredible football player. But then, you know, questions that we get during draft season of, well, why are you ranking this team's wide receiver two ahead of other teams' wide receiver ones? It bears itself out in terms of looking at Davante Adams' stuff, where he has like a 26 and a half percent target share, and then the LA Rams are top four in terms of wide receiver usage. So that naturally, when you combine those two together, places him as a better target and a better fantasy option than true wide receiver ones on other teams.

Yeah. And Stafford's playing out of his mind, and they're coming down with everything. So right now, the Rams on their deep targets are completing the highest rate of them in the NFL. And yeah, both these guys are just going to continue to eat as long as these guys stay healthy. So it's the Chargers number one in usage for the wide receivers. The Rams are number two, then the Dallas Cowboys at third overall. So yeah, these guys are just automatic plays. And like you pointed out, uh, 22 out of 22 takes advantage of only having 10 guys on the field for the game winner. So they got lucky there, but that was that was cool to see. Um, yeah, I mean, like Puka right now, just for context, like everyone knows how good he is.

He's on pace to have 30 more receptions than the NFL record. I mean, that's, I mean, what are we doing here?

Uh, and then, yeah, I mean, the running backs are still changing much more than they did last season. They were getting a ton of push in this game. This is one of those games, Hayden, that if Blake Corum didn't exist, and Kyren Williams got all of it, he would have easily cleared 100 yards. He was getting six, seven yards, eight yards a pop. And yet when they put in Blake Corum, I'm not saying it's a negative at all. Like, he's really good when he pops in there. He just skims off 30% of the volume or whatever from Kyren Williams. And because of that, Kyren Williams at this point is running back 17 on the season.

So last week it was a season low for expected points for Kyren Williams. At the same time, a season high for Blake Corum. So Sean McVay is keeping his word right now. So yeah, Kyren's the wide receiver 17, or the running back 17 on running back 12 usage, and over the last couple weeks, those would be kind of dwindling too. So Kyren's still, no doubt about it, a really nice RB2, but the days of him being, I think, a top 10 running back are no longer there with Blake Corum, uh, taking over some of the issues. Also, the Rams are doing all this with, I think, a bad offensive line. They're dealing with injuries. Like all their starters are like just on the injury report. Some of them play, some of them don't, depending on the week. So this is like, this is a Sean McVay, Matthew Stafford, Puka, Davante Adams situation. It is those four guys are just balling.

It is one of those that if they somehow do get healthy and stay healthy though in December and beyond, the Rams are a Super Bowl caliber team in the NFC.

Yep. Easy. Not easy, but you know what we mean.

No, they are. Minnesota Vikings.

Minnesota Vikings are next. I mean, it feels like every single team we're going to talk about here today, offensive line injuries, and these are massive ones here for the Vikings. Ryan Kelly left with a concussion. Then their right tackle, Brian O'Neill, who's been a mainstay on that side coming out of Pitt, was a former tight end, I believe, or remember him at the Senior Bowl, uh, is dealing with an MCL injury. And they were also missing, you know, their other rookie guard on top of this. And then Christian Darrisaw just came back from injury. Uh, what we got was, I think high variance is the perfect definition of it when watching the Carson Wentz game. There were some really good things, and he was letting it rip on some big downfield passes.

And then there were other occasions where we saw the Trebuchet back in the league, and he plants his two feet down and has blinders on with all the pressure around him, and he makes some negative plays on top of it. But maybe KC wants to live in that high variance world because it creates some of those explosives down the field.

Yeah. Once the backup center and their backup right tackle were in, that was a major issue. So those guys, both of them, the backups gave up pressures and turned into sacks, and then Carson Wentz was hot on multiple other, um, dropbacks where he either just took the sack, um, or tried to, like, you see this Carson Wentz man where he tries to dip under it. Like, what? That's not going to work.

He always has done that.

Yeah. It's, it's wild. And then he'll flush out of the pocket, throw the ball out of bounds because he's just hot, and instead of like trying to, like, you know, hit the hot route, he just like, "Oh, I'm hot. I'm taking a sack. I'm throwing the ball into the red area." So, there were some definite very negative plays, and they threw the ball over the middle and down the field at a very nice rate this this game. Now, the Steelers were nowhere near, you know, Justin Jefferson for half the game. I could not believe that. Then the Jordan Addison, you get free production because of a coverage bust. Um, so like you said, there was some, some good and some very clear bad. And McCarthy wasn't handling pressure well, and Carson Wentz has never handled pressure well. So if your right guard, center, and then right tackle are not going to be out there, like now you just have like last year's offense where Sam Darnold's like handling pressure fairly well with two guys that can't. So I don't know, man. I'm a little bit nervous with the offensive line issues.

Yeah. And then even when I was watching that game, Jordan Mason looked awesome. And then you look in the stat book, and it's Jordan Mason at 74 yards on what, 20 touches or something like that. And it's because if you can't block it up, it just makes life hell on a series-in, series-out basis. So, I mean, Jordan Mason's usage is going to be super, super nice when he owns the backfield. I know Xavier Scott gets in there for some catches and things, but it's fun to watch Jordan Mason run. I just wish it was on an offense that had their full complement of offensive line.

Yeah, I think everyone just takes a hit, you know, and then in this one, they were, they were down big. Um, so like Jordan Addison gets home because the coverage bust, um, and because they're trailing a lot, but he's at a 17% target share. So once those things kind of regress a little bit, he's not going to have the same production. And then I think interesting thing that T.J. Hockenson is like not played very well, you know, like right opportunities, uh, but they were asking him to chip a bunch. So, if you have T.J. Hockenson, I think there's guys on the waiver wire and then some other, like, make a trade for somebody because he's gonna have to chip for or to help out his backup right tackle, and then just out in the flats, and like, I'm not sure if I've seen him like make a bunch of guys miss in the last couple years.

Also, am I allowed to ask why they traded a fifth-round pick for Adam Thielen, who has four catches for 37 yards and plays 16% of snaps right now?

Yeah, you are allowed to ask that. What was the point?

Um, okay. New England Patriots are next. Fun team. I actually want to bring up another old wide receiver who is Adam Thielen's former teammate, Stefon Diggs, because this was easily, and I mean easily, his most productive game. Now, if you just look at the sheet, it says he only played 63% of snaps, which is a season high, but doesn't sound like that much. And the context is it would have been far more if this game was at all competitive because he only played one snap in the fourth quarter when it was a blowout. So again, in a tighter game, that could have been all the way back up to 80% snaps here for Stefon Diggs. And he would have been easily among the highest waiver adds if he had been dropped in your leagues.

90% routes, if you cut out the fourth quarter. So quarters one through three, 90% routes. You know, season high in production. And I was complaining that they did not have a wide receiver that could win downfield. And there were two man coverage wins from Stefon Diggs in two different ways against man coverage down the field for chunk gains. And then you also had, um, one versus zone as well. So season high in production, um, 12, uh, one expected fantasy points, 90% routes, all season highs. And the Drake May numbers with, uh, Josh McDaniels are very promising. Like he's, you know, they're moving the football. Success rate's really high, and that they're doing it without a consistent wide receiver one. And now if you get that, I think you're going to have a couple more explosive plays. So, um, Drake May handles himself well. The offensive line is playing better than I would probably have expected with how many, you know, young players or really old players across the offensive line. So, yeah, this is just like classic Josh McDaniels stuff is like, yeah, I've been calling plays for for two decades in the league. Like, I know what I'm doing here. And then Drake May is, he's not even scrambling, you know, like.

It's not like he's like, "Oh, we're just gonna play normal football and keep keep moving the chains." It might be the quietest quarterback four performance on the season that we've seen in quite some time. And he's quarterback four in scoring right now.

Yeah. Yeah. He's really good. Really good. I'm with you. He's really good.

Now, what is also vintage Josh McDaniels is multiple running backs. Raandre Stevenson 57%, Trevian Henderson 31%, Antonio Gibson 18%. With all three healthy, Hayden, it doesn't seem like that is going to change that they'll split things three different ways. It did seem like certain guys got certain drives as we see with that Hindu one and then he got a goal line touchdown, but as we see with some other teams when they sub in a certain player near the goal line, that is definitely not the case here. It's just like, "Hey, whoever's kind of on the field."

Yeah. They get it. Because I was really excited about that first trivia Henderson touchdown and then Antonio Gibson gets the next one.

Gibson got two. He got two goal line carries on separate drives and we know that Raandre, who's bigger than both of these dudes, is going to get his. It's a full-blown rotation. I don't know what we're supposed to do here that these guys are going to have big games randomly like we see some of the shot plays in the pass game and double moves and stuff and Trayvon Henderson will have a 50-yard touchdown on them. I am not going to be able to predict when it's going to happen. So, in the meantime, Raandre is the running back 33 in usage. Henderson's the running back 37 and then Gibson's behind that, but still fairly relevant. So, I don't know, man. It's they're going to be during by-weeks, you can put them in your flex and you're going to cross your fingers and hope. But, it's good news that the Patriots offense is probably better than most people expect.

Yeah. And it's a long season. We will see what happens. Um, I don't think anyone like they all have shown warts at some point this year and so they are all playing still. Yes.

Next up for the Bills, who again gave up a ton of rushing yards in week one, then have kind of shut it down a little bit since then. The Saints and then the Titans over the next three weeks. So there should be some fun Patriots games.

Uh, the Hunter Henry touchdown. You don't see as many fluky touchdowns from a tight end than that. He was outrunning JC Horn to the end zone. Jay-Z Horn was, look, he was trying to blame everybody else while trying to chase. I'm like, you could just go tackle him and just decided not to. It was that play. I was like, what is going on with Carolina?

Yeah, man. That's what I'm telling you. That's what I'm telling you. Uh, it's not good. Uh, I will add though, and we talked about this on the show, that Drake May, when he was miked up for a practice, said that Hunter Henry was on his first ever fantasy football championship team, and now he's gotten Hunter Henry to tight end one status this season so far, which is pretty sweet.

It is cool. I thought Josh Daniels was going to invest in a tight end in this tight end draft that was so loaded and then he didn't. And then I should have immediately, like I did last year, say, "Oh, this is going to be a Hunter Henry season." But, you know, I was just a year early.

Yeah. Never late. Never late. Just early.

Yeah. Hooper gets involved, too. It's backs and tight ends. And they've still been moving the chain. So, I'm very optimistic about Steph Diggs. I think there's a chance that Steph Diggs like could have an underrated, like believe what we just saw this last game. Like, I think that there's a chance he can go like on a very real run for the rest of the year.

I think he's a really nice trade candidate out there. I'm gonna bring that up on Thursday's show as well.

Nice.

Okay, let's talk about the New Orleans Saints. Um, we mentioned feisty every single week. My only concern with them is if you keep losing, how long does that competitiveness last? Because they are still fighting in these fourth quarters. They're still picking up yards in these fourth quarters. That's different when you're 0 and three or 0 and four versus 0 and 12.

Um, and the other talking point is that this was easily Kendrick Miller's best game. He was running through tackles. He was creating yards on his own. Hasn't been a great Alvin Chimera season so far. He's definitely not getting as much work in the passing game. I am not saying they're going to trade Alvin Chimera. I'm not saying he's going to get benched at all. But maybe this just turns into much more of a 50-50 split because, you know, versus Dennis Allen, like this team, Kell Moore, can actually see that Kendrick Miller has talent and they want to utilize it.

Yeah, he's playing early and often and has looked good. And then on the flip side with Alvin Chimera, he is just not ripping off like the first down, 10-yard gains, the explosive plays. It's been, you know, three yards in a cloud of dust. And the Saints offensive line, while they invested into it heavily over the last couple years, they're all injured right now. So it's like not even a good offensive line, too. So I'm hoping we get Alvin Chimera traded. Like that would just make the most sense for everybody involved. Like Alvin Chimera on a contender, the Saints get a draft pick. They got to see what they have with Kendra Miller, who's looked all right.

Like why shouldn't this happen, you know? And also, it's not just like the same internal hire that the Saints have had at head coach year after year after year after year. Like this is like new fresh eyes and he might just be like, "What are we doing? We obviously should start trading away some of the old guys that have been on the Saints forever." And we have never seen that happen. But I do think they did with last year with Marshon Latimore and like why wouldn't you trade Alvin Chimera in a week or two? You know, we have seen these backups graduate into starting jobs like with what happened with Woody Marks and we were a couple weeks ahead of that of that one. Kendrick Miller, we should probably add to that list of try to be a couple weeks early rather than have to spend, you know, 100% of your fab on him.

Anything you want to say about the tight ends or the wide receivers on this team or is that pretty evident? I mean, Chris Ave is getting the vast majority of routes and targets and then it's Jawan Johnson and then behind that it's Rashid Shahid. While we like Rashid Shahid, it's pretty evident he's lower on the target totem pole than Olive and then Jawan Johnson.

He is like even Shahed though, because it's a scam. He's the wide receiver 39 and wide receiver 33 usage and he's had over 8.7 expected points in all four games. Like he's he's holding the line. They just need like we need to remove one of these guys back from the offense. Um, other note, Taesm Hill and Foster Maro are practicing right now. Um, if you want to sell high on Jawan Johnson, I think how dare you. You know, like you take your ROI and you keep it moving. If you had like Tucker Craft and you bid on Jawan Johnson, I would I would I think he's a trade candidate.

Philadelphia Eagles and it's time for your least favorite comments of the week. Hey, when I went back and watched this game and the drop backs, I was looking. I was like, "I've seen Jaylen Herz drop back 11 times in this second half and I haven't seen a single Philadelphia Eagle catch a football." They didn't complete a single pass.

In the second half. A single pass.

I know.

And then you look at it. Another great Sam Hoppin chart. The Eagles have the highest percentage of three and outs across the NFL right now, over 45% of the time. That's worse than the Titans. That's worse than the Bengals. Um, it hasn't mattered. They are winning a ton of football games. And then we can get into the running game stuff on top of it, too. They don't turn the ball over and then they have some explosive plays like that's why you know they're hanging in there and they've had some clutch moments. Um, it's obviously not sustainable. They have to play better on offense than what they currently are playing. Um, so yeah, that's that. And then the Saquon Barkley stuff is like he's not ripping off the big play as he was previously.

And it's not even close. Like so no. His longest run so far is of 16 yards. Our buddy Connor Allen pointed this out. Just three games last year, he didn't have a run of at least 18 yards and he's already gone four games of that so far. Okay, last two seasons this team was obviously first in yards created before contact. This year they're 16th.

They're average. And that's kind of make Saquon Barkley's rushing numbers average on top of it. This can change at any point, but through four weeks, it is definitely going in the direction of, hey, this guy had 400 touches last year, and you are cutting off the explosiveness or even, you know, the mid-explosiveness off his game.

Yeah, I think also just like the offensive line's not nearly as good. Back to new right guard, Lane Johnson in and out at right tackle, Dickerson in and out of the lineup playing through a back injury, you know. Um, Jordan Maya was complaining that like the offensive line is just like not up to par. You know, he's like, "This is not a Saquon Barkley issue." And I largely think that that is true. Um, so I think they'll sort of figure it out, but they ran it very hot last year on like how healthy and dominant the offensive line was.

I will add, we just brought up not completing passes or sustaining drives and all this type of stuff. Lack of explosives and the bottoming out basically of Saquon Barkley is running back 13 at this moment. Like we're talking about bottoming out at other round one and round two picks in fantasy football. If the worst you're getting is running back 13, which to me this can improve as a season goes along when they, you know, new play caller, better offensive line play, and all that type of stuff.

Uh, I'm not like panicking on the Squan stuff. Uh, I still think it can get there in the second half of the season for sure.

Yeah, definitely. So like Dallas got a two-point touchdowns at the goal line stuff like eventually that will iron itself out. But yeah, his his best play on offense was like that, you know, the end of round off the the tush push variant for Saquon Barkley. So, it has not gone well. I also mentioned this, the AJ Brown stuff from last week, he got the ball like thrown to him a lot. A couple of them definitely sailed out of bounds. I've seen better effort and like raw speed out of AJ Brown, too. So like, um, sometimes the Divas like take it a little bit too too far and I hope they can get him on more crossing routes and less stop routes and stuff, but he was like not coming back to the ball at all. Um, he just had a very odd season.

So Broncos defense next for this team and that's a potential tight game and then you have the Giants after that, then the Vikings and the Giants again, and then the Packers. So, you know, I think how some people discuss the Eagles, it's like, "Oh, they'll just flip the switch when they want to." But like, as this, I know they did in week three, but like at some point, like just why not flip it and play good football every time.

I know. I agree. Yeah. I think probably offensive court not nearly as good as it was in the last couple seasons and still they have not lost when everyone's been healthy.

Right? It's just frustrating because they have really good players and they should play good football.

Well, yeah. AJ Brown's the wide receiver 50 and Dvonte Smith the wide receiver 46, you know, like.

Right. And and Saquon's the running back 14.

Right. And then Dallas Garden's been, he's the guy eating and he's hard to predict.

Okay, Pittsburgh Steelers. You and I in the wide receiver show and just talking about DK Metaf, did not expect the DK Metaf stat line. Then I went and watched the game and he had five catches, which, you know, is on the pretty high end for DK Metaf. And then the 80 yard and that touchdown obviously changed the entire thing. Uh, to me, hey, now I'm not sure if you watched it. To me, he was the answer for Aaron Rogers on a lot of the hot or pressure looks that the Vikings threw at him that last season with the Jets. Aaron Rogers had zero answers for and that was smart. Rather than lining him up on the sideline, they lined him up very tight to the formation and Rogers just flipped it to him and then this Vikings defense just isn't tackling nearly as well as it did last year. And you have a big guy who can run a four 29 and goodbye, he's gone.

Yeah, this is like brand new usage for DK Mechaf. His AOT's at 6.4 yards. If you compare that to just like the other like biggest changes in AOT year after year, it's like DK Mechaf is standing out where his his usage is completely different. That was the pre-snap RPO stuff where he's like throw a screen to him one step, throw it out to him. Little slot sitting in zone and then obviously the splash play was just Harrison Smith could not make that tackle and he's off for the races. So yeah, like the usage he he's been really good this year and but he is wide receiver 52 and expected points because everything's like closer to the line of scrimmage. The offense is just kind of unique right now. So it's like not Arthur Smithian. It's not Aaron Rogersy fully. It's getting more closer to like the Aaron Rogers format than like the Arthur Smith under center play action downfield stuff. So cool to see. He's like still extremely fast. If we're getting like a couple slant routes and stuff underneath to kind of buoy his floor, that's obviously good.

John Ledger pointed this out that Aaron Rogers current A dot is at 5.2 yards. The next closest in the league is at 6.4, which is Kyler Murray. Back to 2006, according to PFF, only one quarterback has ever had an A dot lower than six. Again, that is Aaron Aaron Rogers at 5.2.

Yeah. And that was Alex Smith with 5.9. So Rogers is still .7 shorter than that at this point. So he's.

He's just getting the football out as quickly as possible.

All right, San Francisco 49ers mash unit short week. Who knows who is playing between Ricky Piol and Jawan Jennings and Brock Pury all dealing with a multitude of things. Meanwhile, CMC's blood sacrifice has allowed him to be the healthiest player in the NFL despite touching the football the most. It just makes like when you whenever you feel confident about how who's going to get injured before the season starts, like just know that you don't. Just know that you don't. And like Christian McCaffy get hurt this next week. Like definitely possible.

Um, I don't know who's going to play. I don't know how to handicap this game at all. Ricky Pieraw has like a quote unstable knee, which is usually a PCL injury, which is what Brock Bowers has been playing through. So even if he suits up, I don't know how if he's going to be the same. I don't know if you went back and watched the Brock Pery stuff, but he's like very clearly not himself with with his toe injury and he said that he's sore and then Dwan Jennings took one of the shots of the year to his ribs.

Um, and I don't know if he's going to play. Probably will, but yeah, I have no idea what to do here.

I mean, there's really nothing we can do. We will talk about it on tomorrow's show in the running back rankings, but even at that point, like even if these guys don't practice, they one or none or three of them might suit up on Thursday. Like I kind of hate it when these really good teams play on Thursday even though if I want to watch a good game because at this point in the season they're injured and you have to make massive lineup decisions an hour before and we don't get it covered on the show basically.

Yeah. Um, one just like I was just building some random charts and like this one stood out. This is just the two-minute drill targets this year. Christian McAffrey has 14 of them. I mean nobody else is even close to that. So the Christian McCaffrey in the two-minute drill is like a free, you know.

He's a better pass catcher than runner at this point.

Yeah. Yeah. No, that's true. That is the other thing that is not going to change about this 49ers team. This offensive line is bad. Like Trent Williams is like not the all-pro Trent Williams and he's a Pro Bowlish level Trent Williams and the rest of the offensive line, which lost like Aaron Banks and depth pieces and other players, are playing through injury and we've been begging them to draft a center and right tackle and they haven't. It's just like not an elite offensive line. Like Shanahan's like made the most out of bad offensive lines, but if we're not getting the same Trent Williams stuff, that's gonna, you know, matter at the margins. Um, I don't know if there's any information we can glean from that like or anything we can do about that. But it's I think gonna limit the 49ers chance of like competing in the NFC.

Well, you know who's about to return hopefully from injury with all these guys banged up is George KD in week six. So.

But not Aayuk. We got like that weird thing about Branduk where he's like not close to returning yet, but he I see him running. Like I don't know. They're being weird.

Seattle Seahawks. Do you want me to go in a one-minute Kenneth Walker monologue or?

Okay. Please. Can you just turn the page to the running back usage overall? This will help me define the entire thing. All right. Because when we look at the running back usage chart, you see that Seattle is above average in that, right? So, Kenneth Walker in all your drafts and I know on underdog closed as running back 17. Okay, this is when beginning of September, bing bang, boom, fantasy draft season was over. So, let's look at the running backs drafted ahead of him and after him to put some context on this. All right, running back 15. Again, this is closing ADP. Trevian Henderson, he's a rookie and he's currently running back 35 and as we talked about a three-person time share at this moment. Running back 16. Bree Hall, currently running back 25, was in a huge split and was destined to be in a huge split until Brilin Allen's MCL and he was losing high value touches and we'll see how that changes. But again, running back 25 at this moment. Harris Kenneth Walker drafted running back 17, your current running back 15. Okay. Chuba Hubard running back 18. He's running back 16 at this moment, but as we talked about, he's had his huge production in the receiving game, and the team isn't nearly as good as many of the others we're about to talk about. Alvin Chimera, he's currently the running back 26 after being selected as the running back 19. Very little receiving work. Running back 20, R.J. Harvey, also a rookie, also running back 34. Running back 21, James Connor out for the season. Running back 22, DeAndre Swift, he's running back 24 on the year despite being a true bellcow in his offense. Running back 23, Isaiah Pacheco, he's dust. He's running back 41. And then Tony Pard, running back 24. He's running back 28 over on the year, owning 90% of the work in the worst team in the NFL. So my point being, I understand it's extremely frustrating when you see a guy who's explosive, who is creating chunk gains out there on an NFL field and he's not getting the goal line scores that is going to his running mate in Zack Sharp. But think of the pocket of the running backs that you drafted this player in. All the ones that I just mentioned, it's not the James Cook tier, you know, it's not the Kairen Williams tier. It's not the group Amaran Hampton that was selected above him. It's this guy. It's this group that you were deciding between and to me I would rather have Kenneth Walker than anyone else on that list rest of season.

Yeah. And then last week, there was some Kenneth Walker madness where Charbanet got some extra touches in there for classic Kenneth Walker stuff. But yeah, he's he's got a clear pathway and like you said, he had what 20 touches this this last game. And then I'll make your point even more about just that range of of draft picks is the wide receivers in that range too. So you can see Kenneth Walker aside from Courtland Sutton, you know, DK Mechaf, Devonte Smith, we'll see about Jaylen Waddle, but Jameson Williams, Terrell McMillan, DJ Moore, some of the other rookies, Terry McLuren, like these were the guys that you were drafting next to Kenneth Walker on top of that. Matthew Golden, Jerry Judy. So it's it has not been like a great round four or five turn just in general. So, uh, aside from George Pickkins, who we were all over, he was like the guy that you wanted in that range.

Correct. So, again, after week one, we adjusted. This is going to be a split. That was very evident. But what we did get right is that Kenneth Walker fits this Clint Kubak rushing scheme to a tee. And you can see that in the big gains that he has. And I also read that like, well, Zack Sharbonet is the dependable player. He's the one that and when you look at the underlying numbers that's like not true. You know, he's his stuff rate in terms of getting negative yards or a zero yard run that's at 33%. Kenneth Walkers is at 23%. So yeah, does it look crazy when Kenneth Walker knows he can't get anything and so he runs in the opposite direction and picks up a five-yard loss 100%. But at the same time he's just really good. Like to me, he's a good player and I would want to bank on a good player in a scheme that he fits really well in an offense, Hayden, that is like a well-oiled machine right now and is outperforming many expectations out there.

Yeah, this is all burying the lead. This is all Sam Darnold stuff, man. Like he's playing very good football.

You can go on your monologue now if you want to.

I mean, look at any stat, watch Sam Darnold. It's not like in structure plays either. He's making plays by himself and JSN's taking the leap and like they don't even have a second person to throw the football to and Sam Darnold's still like extremely efficient behind an offensive line that's like been mediocre at best. So yeah, I think the Sam Darnold stuff is is helping everybody. But like you said, they have the same exact expected points per game. Charbanine Walker 10.8. Kenneth Walker's averaging 12.8 fantasy points and Zack Sharby's at 7.7. So it's a humongous efficiency gap between the two. So, we'll see.

We mention it all the time in this episode of I don't know who this play caller is as an identity, what this team is trying to do offensively. It is so clear to see who the Seahawks want to be, and they're achieving it already right now. Uh, they do have some really tough games coming up. It's the Bucks, then the Jaguars, then the Texans, the Commanders after that, the Cardinals, and the Rams. So, it's going to be fun to watch the Seahawks team every single week. And this defense is a lot of fun. And then this offense knows who they are and you can't say that across the league.

Playoff team to me.

I like it. Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Has it been confirmed that Bucky Irving was one of the names that got an MRI or is that just kind of like speculation at this point?

No, he got an MRI. I haven't heard the, you know, if it's a bad news or good news.

Uh, if and by the way, he was electric. Obviously the catch down the sideline was awesome. He's just a fantastic player making people miss in the open field. If he does miss time, I'm not saying he is, but if he does, uh, I wonder how much of an expanded role Rashad White is going to have or if they get Shawn Tucker more involved. I think they do, but we disagree on that.

Yeah, I mean, I think it'll be Rashad White clear lead back and then Sean Tucker will play some. Uh, but yeah, who knows? They need their right guard and right tackle back to be fully themselves. Uh, they I mean, were really living on the edge with what Baker Mayfield was doing. Obviously had the scramble drill to Bucky Irving. Uh, and then that throwing that deep pass to Amecha went through four defenders fingertips to him. Uh, aside from that, was not like the prettiest offense I've seen. So they're they're missing some Chris Godwin's fault. Like he was running his normal outbreakers and having these targets in tight windows.

And he just wasn't catching the football.

Yep. Uh, it was just rust to me. So maybe that can change immediately. Who knows? He didn't look fast or slow. I thought his speed was like Chris Godwin E. And then like you said, it was just credit to the Eagles. Both corners, Quinton Mitchell and Cooper Deene were just lights out in this one and they were plucking the ball away and Chris Godwin probably catches a couple of those if he was like not banged up. So it wasn't like I was like, "Oh my god, he's just limping and it's it's a disaster." But um, those were the difference in the game.

Tennessee Titans, two teams to go. Uh, Alec Aomomanor has officially overtaken Calvin Ridley in terms of team lead and target share. He's at 22%. Calvin really is at 21%. Uh, I am searching for the first win for this team. They have the Cardinals, then the Raiders maybe, then the Patriots, then the Colts, then the Chargers, then the Texans. It can get pretty rough here. I'm not sure if the light at the end of the tunnel is in sight. Is there anything you want to bring up here?

Sell Tony Pard if you can. Ta Spears is coming back and he has no room to lose any snaps at all. And then I'm I'm looking I'm like Eloor, the spreadsheets are all right. Like he's the wide receiver 38, wide receiver 37 usage. You mentioned the target share. Have you guys seen a single play where he has created separation and it has not been a scramble drill? Like it's the same old crazy that we're seeing from Cam Ward throwing the across the field to Elica. We've seen one highlight one-handed play with a defender draped over him. They're just like not a sustainable part of this offense. They're trying to get some other rookies like Gunnar Helm's going to play a little bit more moving forward. We'll see. They they have they just don't have any good players.

Like, yeah. They have a crazy defense. They invested a ton the offensive line and that's more injured than they wanted it to be. They have nobody good on the football team.

Like that's Jeffrey Simmons is sweet. But yes, Devonte Sweep is injured. But yeah, other than that.

The Texans forgot to block some Jeffrey Simmons on a couple plays. He's the only good player on the team. Skip Holtz, who is the OC, but did not get play calling duties handed down to him by Brian Callahan, which is also a very questionable thing, uh, was on the microphone and said that Gunnar Helm, who's a rookie tight end out of Texas, quote, "will see increased opportunities." This is massive for the 12 people who care about Chico Quano. Because right now, the Titans line up in three wide receiver sets 87% of the time. That means that if Gunnar Helm is just more of your prototypical Y tight end, then he's going to play over Shiggo Quanko rather than next to him more often.

Yeah, he's a better blocker and then but Gunnar Helm can't move in the receiving game really.

He can have some sweet contested grabs though. He's got good hands.

Yeah, he's a he's a big fella. Um, yeah. I mean, when they fire everybody, I mean, when they, like you said, they skipped over the offensive coordinator for play calling duties, and then the offensive line coach is the father of the head coach. So, when they do decide to fire everybody.

It's going to be the replacements of coaches. It's literally the ball boy is going to be out there teaching the tights.

All right, I'm calling it. You ready? This is what happened last season with the Raiders, right? And so, who stepped in? Scott and Nor Turner. I don't even know what Scott and North Turner are doing right now, but Scott and Nor Turner, I'm already calling this are going to be the play calling duo for the Tennessee Titans at some point this year. And then Joe Brady takes over in 2026.

Yeah. I mean, that's the difficult decisions when when they decide to fire everybody. Like literally, they're firing. Everybody's going to say, "I'm done."

Whoa. Scott Turner right now. That brings up a United States Secretary of Housing and Development. Scott Turner.

Which, by the way, there's a lot more football coaches getting into that sector if you haven't noticed. Scott Turner is the passing game coordinator of the New York Jets, so that is not going to happen.

Josh. Dang. Yeah. I thought I was on to something there.

I thought you like. But they're not throwing the football well either.

Yeah.

Okay, we'll close this out. It's been a three-hour show with the Washington Commanders. Debo Samuel, my guy, wide receiver 10 on the season. And Hayden, even me, the big advocate for Debo, did not expect on fourth down to burn a cornerback on a vertical route. And that's exactly what he did. It's like 2018 Debo Samuel all over again that we got.

Yeah. He's played lights out like it's he looks incredible. This is a perfect scheme for him. And then with Terry McLuren playing through injuries and he's in like that downfield exceiver role. Everything on the inb breakakers and all that type of stuff is his and then he's making some explosive plays down the field and then in the ground game too. So like he's an automatic play. Feel excellent about Debo Samuel. Would take him over to Terry McLuren rest of the season no problem. And then uh hopefully we get Jaden Daniels back this week. But Marcus Marion has been playing, he's very, very good in this this system and like he's been holding the line in fantasy purposes and getting the ball to Debo.

Um, yeah. And then the running backs, like it's the most even committee. Like, somebody tell somebody paint me the picture on how Bill Crosky Merritt is going to matter. Like, I'm waiting. Go for it.

I think no matter what, when you're watching this game, Bill looks the best when he's out there on the field. He leads the NFL right now in percentage of five-plus yard runs. Okay. I know he didn't get his first carry until 7:39 left in the second quarter and then really didn't touch the football again until the second half, but this is just eye test stuff. He's the best runner on this team and they were losing on every single one of his touches that he got in the second half. I think the pendulum has swung almost totally in the opposite direction in terms of fantasy football stuff where he was a meme to open the season because his name is Bill. He's a seventh rounder. They trade away Brian Robinson Jr. because of it. Oh, he's going to be the starter. He's not even close to being the starter right now. like in terms of a lead ball carrier, but just when I'm watching it, I can see if they think that he's the best runner and if he gets 50-plus% of the work, then he is going to be a big asset here. And to me, that is a possibility and he's almost underrated in that outcome at this moment. I think that outcome that you're outlining is like very possible, but they're 30th in expected points to the running backs collectively and he's not going to play passing downs most likely. And I don't think that Chris Rodriguez goes to zero. I think he'll get to down a little bit and then Debo and then Jaden Daniels like I think the pathway is absolutely there to be the running back 26. I'm waiting for the pathway to open up where he's the running back 18 and to me we're still a long ways away. So, he might it just it comes down to sentiment. If people are done with with the meme and stuff, then yeah, maybe he's a buy low. Um, but I've always just been a little bit curious on how we're like really going to take this one off.

It's an interesting one to watch moving forward. Again, every single time it's only like seven touches that we get. I turn it on, I'm like, "Dang, that's a cool dead leg move. That's a cool jump cut."

He's making people miss. He's staying super patient. I just at some point believe that they're just going to lean into them a bit more and then more of those touches equal, you know, more five-yard gains and those types of things. But who knows?

Who knows? Okay. That does it. That was a good show. Hopefully you all enjoyed it. Again, Wednesdays we have our running back rankings. Thursdays the trade show, which is massive again this week. Fridays wide receivers. Saturdays quarterbacks and tight ends. And then we do it all over again on Sundays with the start sit show and then instant reaction. So again, the best way to support us is to go on overdog and play pick 'em or drafts, battle royale, whatever you fancy. We added ladders on top of it. So go and try out all the new products. To make the show even longer, I just wanted to mention there was a guy in our comments from Stats Versus Film last week that said that um we've we're being lazy and that we've like reached the YouTube cliff and we're just like not putting the effort in. I was like, "What? We're being lazy?"

Somebody said that we. There was a comment on that.

There was a comment. It was because we're not showing the film for and there's reasons why we're not doing that, but they're like, "Oh, they're not putting in the work anymore." I'm like, "We are adding shows. This is a this has got to be what, an hour, two and a half hours of show. We have more shows than days of the week."

I would have left a massive comment if I saw that one.

I would have clapped back.

Oh man, that got me. We can be lazy if they if he wants us to.

Oh my goodness. Maybe in a couple years. We'll see. All right, everyone. Thanks for tuning in. Up the villa. Shout out Mosho and Whis and Hayden. Talk to you soon. See?