Hayden, viewers, I think it's fair to say that nailing the year three wide receivers might be the critical piece to winning your fantasy football league this season. Just think about it, okay? We're about to talk about four names that have already been selected in the top two rounds at any point in their first two seasons in a fantasy football draft and they all flopped. They all flopped. So the question is, were we wrong or is this like the perfect post hype opportunity to find incredible value? And there's only one person that can answer that for us. It is now our colleague over at Yahoo, Matt Harmon. How you doing, buddy?

Colleagues, that sounds good, boys. That sounds really good. Now, if we have any big disagreements, you know, knockout, drag down, you know, fights or whatever on the show, I can just go straight to HR after this. So, this is this is really good for me. But, no, I I am number one super excited to have you guys here at Yahoo. I mean, I've respected both of your guys for work for so long and it's going to be an incredible partnership. It's already been super fun so far and we're just getting started. Um, but secondly, and maybe more importantly for the viewers out there, I'm still I'll admit right off the top like I'm still really bullish on a lot of the players in this class. Like there are it hasn't happened for some guys. It's kind of happened and then unh happened for a few of them as you mentioned Josh. But you know going back and looking at this group for the year three charting for reception perception man there's still a lot of players I really want to bet on. So I'm excited to talk about this.

Yeah, there's kind of like two different tiers of players here. You got some like your smaller guys and there's like four guys that are all very similar to me. I'm trying to nitpick the exact differences between them all on their tape and then after that you have to, you know, acknowledge what offense they're actually playing in. But I went back and pretty much everybody I went back to after watching them, I went to my rankings and I just kind of moved them up a little bit.

Yeah.

Every single one of these guys just a little bit up.

Love all that. And I didn't even mention that outside of those four, we have two other former first round picks that we're talking about here today. So like there's a lot of investment in in these players. How we're going to do this, we're going to go name by name of how they're being drafted right now over on Yahoo. give you stats, the underlying metrics, and maybe most importantly the eye test with a number of these guys and see how they fit in a lot of new situations. So, let's kick things off with the man in this group that's going earliest. That is Malik Neighbors, fourth pick of the third round right now on Yahoo. That is wide receiver 13. Harmon let me know right before we got started that Link Neighbors is avoiding the pup list. I mean, does this change your entire outlook, our entire outlook of Malik Neighbor's season and really where we should be drafting him right now?

Yeah, I mean, listen, I think we still have a long way to go with this Malik Neighbors injury situation. But, I mean, for God's sakes, this is the most positive day of Malik Neighbors news we've had in a long, long time. So, um, I'll take it. Yeah. I mean, honestly, he's been somebody that just because of the way the the tenor and and kind of the way they've talked about the the injury and everything, I just really haven't even been thinking about. Honestly, just haven't even really been considering. I mean, I obviously if you're doing like best drafts, that's one thing, but if you're looking at like traditional reddraft leagues, there's just he's going to fall in an area where there are so many good wide receiver picks that I like this year that he's just been someone I'm like, "All right, I'll I'll kind of just cross him off and somebody's gonna like him more than me." Now, if he's going to play, then I mean, this does change the conversation here. Even if, and I think we should probably acknowledge that he might not be himself all of 2026. Like, even if he's going to be active week one and play throughout the course of the season, he he might be a diminished version of himself. But if he's not a diminished version of himself, this is a guy that is very clearly, not even just based on like the stats and the results so far, but reception perception, the eye test, this guy is clearly of any of this group is is on the fastest track and is like right there knocking on that door of like a true tier one receiver in the NFL. And when I say that, I mean like that's like three, four, five guys at any given point that is in that first tier. Um, and I've got some RP data to kind of talk about that and and unpack that a little bit. But yeah, man, this guy is is is right on the precipice of graduating to that group and unfortunately just got hurt after, you know, four or so games with Russell Wilson last year.

I'll say this, I think he's like the most mispriced player in fantasy right now. I I was reading Jordan Ronan from the last couple weeks and he's all of a sudden been more optimistic. He was kind of being like, "Hey, what the hell's going on here?" And then the last couple weeks he's like I think he's not going to be on the the pup list like the the actual pup list like during the season. The fact that he's avoided the pup list like the training camp pup list is all the data that I need here. Even if he's like 85% of what he has been throughout his career that's still like the historical averages for T. Higgins Z Flowers all the third round wide receivers. And if I'm going to be, you know, taking the exception player coming off of an injury, had a little bit of setback in the offseason, it's probably the freak athlete that's 23 years old who's been a wide receiver one and there's no competition. The number two wide receiver for the Giants right now is Darius Sllayton. Darius Sllayton is not practicing right now either. So like I think he can go absolutely crazy. And when he's been the wide receiver one in fantasy, the Giants from his rookie season through week four when he got hurt, they were 31st in points per game. 31st. I don't think the Giants are going to be 31st this year in scoring. And if he's going to be out there in week one, why shouldn't he be next to Dvonte Smith, AJ Brown, the two three turn? That's where I'm ranking him right now. And he's been going in round four. I think that this is going to correct really quick.

Just to update everyone on the timeline, uh towards ACL and lateral meniscus in week four. Surgery was delayed a month at that point. Then he had a setback. A second surgery was needed to remove scar tissue that was restricting his rehab. But it seems like ever since that second surgery, uh, the rehab has been going great despite, you know, videos that we see on social media, uh, him jocking to first base in a charity softball league. Like everything's to be seems to be on the right track. And Matt, what you said about he's kind of out of sight, out of mind because of who he's going around is exactly how I've interpreted, too. like he's going extremely early on Yahoo in comparison to other platforms, but no matter what, he was being selected around like the the Garrett Wilson's, the Mecha Bukas, T. Higgins, Lad Maki, who we're going to talk about here in a little bit, many more names. And it's just difficult for me to go into a draft room and say, "Well, until today, all of the feedback that we've gotten from Malik Neighbors is either mysterious or negative." Whereas, I can paint a really pearly picture of how great these wide receivers going around him could explode this year and like be the guy that you need in round three or round four. But now based on this and even if he isn't back to 100%. Uh I have to change that tune completely. And Matt, I think that's always fun for us to do when we approach July and August because we've been talking about these players since May and had these firm hard stances and now we have to change them.

Yeah. I mean, for like a different example, when we get to talking about Roma Dunes, I don't feel like I've changed my thought on that at all throughout like since the season ended last year, like that Bears situation, because I we all knew DJ Moore was was going to, you know, be gone and pretty much nothing has changed from that. This is one where yeah, I'm glad that what I said in June or May probably doesn't apply to what it is in August, which is which is great because there's nothing worse than talking about this stuff all offseason and like you said, it's just a metronome of the the entire thing. But I I do kind of want to just take a step back and talk about neighbors as an individual player for a second because I think that's really the the crux of all of this is that yeah like the names that you mentioned Z Flowers and Amecha Ibuka good players I like these players this is a guy that is at a different level than that like even Ibuka who was a, you know, a first round receiver prospect to me Z Flowers a first round receiver prospect to me like this was a tier higher of a prospect was Malik Neighbors and he has and I had three guys as tier one prospects in this class and he's the only one that like slam dunk. No doubt about it. The door is shut. He has been what he's supposed to be in the NFL. And I would say that he had kind of a dumber role last year than he did as as a rookie. And again, it it's hard Hayden, right? Because he played all like the entirety of the his season last year, which was only a few games, was with Russell Wilson, so it was very much like the Russell Wilson offense. It's all go routes. I mean, he ran a go route on 25% of the routes I chartered for him, which was his entire season, because that's what Russell Wilson does. I came out of his rookie season, and I actually had a conversation with Malik Neighbors after his rookie season, talking about the detail that he takes to being an after catch player, which I think might be the thing that is is most diminished with him coming back from the injury, at least to start, but we'll we'll put a pin in that.

I was like, this guy's got to have more plays in space in year two than he did in year one. He was in space on 48% of his catches in year one in reception perception that actually fell to 33%. So it just I I think even and obviously we're talking about a Matt Naggie offense here which is let's be honest that's tough. At the same time though I think he can be used in some of these ways where you know look we're two different galaxies of of talents but like the way they've used Rasheed Rice to like get the ball in his hands in the Kansas City Chiefs offense. We're talking about him in some of those gimmick roles. Neighbors is going to be a different beast. And again, just as a route runner, he is in a really small select group of players in reception perception at this point. Again, this is a truncated sample. It's not a full season sample. So, keep that in mind when I say this. But over in the reception perception era, so 2014 to current, these are the only receivers that I've charted who have taken 30 than 30 fewer than 30% of their sampled snaps in the slot and have cleared the 98th percentile in success rate versus press coverage.

AJ Brown, Devonte Adams, Jamar Chase, Justin Jefferson three times, Odell Beckham three times. And then now this truncated sample for Malik Neighbors. So, a little bit dangerous to put his name near Odell Beckham considering how his career with the Giants went with injuries and Beckham is currently on the roster, right?

But still, yeah, that's the type of talent we're talking about here.

It was kind of fascinating to see him in that role that like every single play was just down the field, but you can see how fast he is on those reps and we saw in the first year where so much of it was kind of like underneath and some of it was a little bit more static than I would want and some like back shoulder type of stuff, but nothing like yards after the catch wise. He's so close to Jamar Chase like when he's fully healthy and Jamar Chase is like literally slot outside, underneath, over the top, over crossing over the middle, it doesn't matter. He's the best in the league at like all that stuff. I think Malik Neighbors is like this far below across the board. But I think we're talking about that level of player. And the Giants, let's be honest, they absolutely have to pepper him with targets this year. Whether he's 80% of himself, 100% of himself, it doesn't matter. Like you just look around the room, okay, there's nobody else out there. Like the other thing I was going to say, even if we go into this year and he misses week one, week two, you don't take zeros in your starting lineup. You throw Josh down in your freaking starting lineup and then you wait for Malik Neighbors, you get some points, and then you keep this thing going. Like I think that I'm glad Matt hit on this, the starting point that we're talking about when coming back from injury is one of the best wide receivers in the NFL. So, as much as we like these other guys that he's been going around, like we're hoping they become like 90% of Malik Neighbors, Malik Neighbors, even coming back as 90% of himself is one of the best wide receivers in the NFL still.

So, Hayden, do you think he just totally rebounds from an ADP standpoint and now we'll just go in that cluster of Nico Collins, George Pickkins, AJ Brown, Devonte Smith?

I think it'll be close. I would put him at the end of that tier and let's just like see how the rest of this offseason goes. I will say Drake London and Nico Collins and AJ Brown are in excellent spots. Like those guys, we're talking about very good players without the ACL. So, I think it would take a lot for me to get over that hump, but I do think like he he should be like ahead of Dvonte Smith. Like Dante Smith's a really good football player, but like he has like environmental issues that will be pretty hard to overcome himself.

Yeah. Just to close this one in that three and a half game sample that we got last year, there might have been one snap where he kind of was given manufactured space. was against the Washington Commanders where he motioned from the left at the snap to the right into a stack that gives him, you know, natural space to work in. Uh, this corner is terrified and then just with his selling from a route standpoint, uh, creates even more separation. Like this is why we talk about pre- snap motion and especially into stacks because if you give that to elite players, not only do you give them again space immediately, then they create even more separation on top of it. Uh, and then he went after the catch, he created another five yards after it. Um, and Matt, you already answered my final question, which is going to be I know reception perception has gone back multiple years of Matt Naggie offenses, like what type of player and what can the the utilization be like for this type of player in a Matt Naggie offense? Uh, and is there any optimism for that?

I mean, I I don't have a lot of optimism for the Matt Naggie offense. No.

Shout out.

I I do. And by the way, I do think that matters a lot when it comes to the run game and talking about, you know, Cam Scataboo and and Tyron Tracy and these guys is that we can be honest and Matt Naggie was a fallback plan for them. They thought Todd Mckin was going to be their offensive coordinator and then obviously he's Cleveland head coach. So I think it pretty much is going to be, you know, Matt Naggie runs the pass game and Greg Roman runs the run game. I don't still don't love that though. Like the the Chiefs pass game is was the one of the least enjoyable to watch over the last couple of years. So, we'll see what that looks like. But yeah, no doubt um neighbors can fit in that sort of create a touch after catch, you know, create space for these guys. If there's one thing this offense does still do well, it is create horizontal space for their players. Um and I do kind of I mean I like Malachi Fields enough as like even just a, you know, kind of a power player and a little bit of a sacrificial guy. So I I think it would be nice if he emerged as the second receiver here.

All right, as you guys can tell this is going to be a long episode, but we have to do it. We got a deep dive. So, buckle up, get comfortable, maybe grab some popcorn, and uh while you're doing that, hit subscribe. This is a whole new era for us here at Yahoo. We're super excited. Uh Matt, we're like 90% done with the inseason schedule on top of, you know, going four days a week until the season starts. And there's going to be quite a lot of crossover. So, subscribe to this channel and obviously subscribe to uh Matt's channel down below. It'll be in the description down below. Okay, let's jump to it. Lad Mananki the ninth pick of the fourth round on Yahoo right now. That's wide receiver 18 at this point. Uh and that's despite finishing last year as the wide receiver 35 in half PPR points per game. Simple question, Matt. Is this the perfect scheme to for him to level up in?

I mean I think he'd be great in any scheme, but yeah, totally. This works out for me. Um, this is another one where I haven't really changed my opinion based on what I kind of thought going into the offseason, which is just like this to me is the most obvious bounceback candidate in the NFL this year at the wide receiver position because like I go back and watch Lad Mani last year. We know what the offensive line was. We know that Keenan Allen was soaking up the, you know, safety blanket, the binky targets there for for Justin Herbert when he's playing in chaos. And by the way, like I don't know, Keenan gets talked about like he's just complete dust. Like he can still play Alabama. He's not he's not peak Keenan Allen. He had been pee Keenan Allen for quite some time, but there's this is why receiver decline is just so tricky that sometimes it is just right off the cliff. But other guys age very gracefully and kind of plateaued at some point. I think Keenan has plateaued here a little bit obviously, but still a useful player. So, it's not as if like, oh, you know, 50-year-old Keenan Allen came and took Vlad Maki's lunch as as it's kind of getting painted on fantasy Twitter. But anyways, point about Maki like I go back and watch him. I don't really think he did anything wrong other than like his contested catch work was, you know, yeah, that's always going to be volatile. Like some mistakes at the catch point this year, especially for a guy like him. I I think that's totally excusable. But as a separator, still just as good as he was most critically like where he wins as a route runner is in those big breaking routes in the intermediate area, which is that's going to be a lot of what this offense wants to do out of heavy personnel packages. He wins against man, he wins against zone. I still think he's a great vertical slot player as well. So 87th percentile in success rate versus manto zone in press coverage this year. Clears all those numbers. Uh was just as good as a rookie as well. So to me, I I think he's somebody that is an obvious bounceback candidate. He's a great fit in this scheme. It's just how high do you want to take him in fantasy is the question based on again a really good group of receivers that I like a lot of these picks here, but he is certainly one of them.

Yeah, I think the two biggest things were definitely the Keenan Allen almost like in a rebounder role like third and six like throw it to him at the sticks and like go break a tackle was kind of the Keenan Allen role and it was fairly effective. Then the big thing was the catchable ball rate went from 78% down to 67%. If you look at the downfield intermediate targets specifically um they were just like I mean he it was like unacceptable and like a lot of that Herbert was like running at the line of scrimmage running away from guys and like those balls had like just no chance. Um I will say the one thing that happened with Vlad Makon I thought like by himself just isolating him was was the contested catch stuff. uh 57% uh as a rookie, three of 14 last year. There's some times where I thought players were kind of playing through him and obviously I had his size that's always going to be something, but as a rookie he was like doing like an Antonio Brown impression uh for a while there and I was like, well, if he's going to do this kind of fooled us during his rookie year because I thought at Georgia some of the contested catch stuff was a bit hit or miss, right? But like Matt says, like that comes and goes and I think that he's not going to have to be put in those situations because of the scheme. uh he's not gonna probably run as many downfield routes because they're getting that from Quinton Johnson, but the intermediate stuff hopefully some more quick hitters and stuff. I think that that type of target is going to come back up. I'm in the fourth round. The only thing I was in the back of my mind is they sometimes will rotate all the personnel grouping and stuff like would they ever take Lad McConi off the field for a couple plays for like Trey Harris stuff? That's probably overthinking things. I think he's in that same cluster as you know Amecha, Guka, Garrett Wilson, that type of tier. I would take him over Luther Burden, but I think Ladam Con is still one of the better wide receivers in the in the league.

I mean, I I don't have a lot of optimism for the Matt Naggie offense. No.

Shout out.

Yeah. You just went through all those names. I mean, I really think that this area of the draft might be the most exciting section for wide receivers. Uh I want all of them and really you can only take two of them at most. And that's frustrating. Really frustrating. We can just list stats of why the environment and how the environment collapsed around him. You guys talked about Justin Herbert running for his life. Apparently, Lad Maki ran a league high 95 pass routes without a pass attempt coming on the play due to sacks, scrambles, and throwaways. Uh, after Joe Alt's injury, this is according to Rich Rebar. Lad averaged 2.7 catches for 38 yards per game. Again, we know that the environment just totally collapsed this past season, but man, when I went back and watched, it's just what you said, Matt, where you can just visualize it in this offense working out so well. Like there was this play, multiple plays against the Chiefs where they weren't necessarily putting heavier bodies on the field, but they were doing condensed splits with like Darius Davis and Keenan Allen staying in and Chel helping, but it was Quinton Johnson running for love of the game down the field and then here comes Lad Mananki underneath it. And both were like technically downfield routes, but it's in that cavern of space between the linebackers and in front of the safeties. And those inb breakers from Lad are diabolical, you know? I mean, the way he cuts inside and then if it's zone, just settles in and finds space and has these little nuance movements to stay in a string with Justin Herbert. Oh, it's so good. It's so good. I don't think he's great after the catch. I think he kind of inherited a little bit of Tyler Lockett syndrome of falling down and preserving his body, but that's okay. Um, he doesn't have to be great in everything, but man, I just think he can be the featured player that Mike McDaniel moves around and gets advantageous looks for and space for and he's going to maximize it even more in the system. Tyler Lockett's actually like kind of the devil's advocate like warning if you want to be out on Lad Mcconkey this year just because number one that was actually my player comparison for him as a prospect was I thought he would be Tyler Lockett and by the way Tyler Lockett was awesome but you know you mentioned the injuries like that's one thing with Lad just I mean he's even in his rookie season he's like scraping himself up off the field you know like putting his body back together like a, you know, a doll or something after getting hit and smacked in some of these intermediate inb breaking routes which will definitely happen in this role and I could see a world where you know you mentioned Hayden like they rotate in a Trey Harris for run blocking work just to give him like a breather and obviously then you're going to run some routes you're going to do play action you know Brennan Thompson like some of these guys just to preserve Vlad Maki's body so I think that's when you're trying to break ties in favor of like an AMC Ibuka or Lad Makanki like I do think I could see like a 140 target season for Ibuka more so than Manki But I mean, yeah, the efficiency could be there for Lad and and there's no question that he shares a lot of variables. I know I mean I I said this at Feb in February, so I'm not just copying everybody else. Like there are a lot of variables here and like the breakout season that JSN had last year. There's a lot of variables that they carry over from Maki as well.

Yeah, I think if he stays healthy, he's going to be a total baller. I think the the snaps might be a little bit less than some of the other guys we're talking about and maybe some of the targets just just because like they don't run three wide receiver sets like pretty much at all. I think they were 29.

Isn't that a good thing? Like you know the show we did with Ryan Heath where I think the Chargers are going to be one of the teams that leans into heavier personnels and not necessarily three tight ends, but you know they brought in a fullback on top of it that has history here. And so if there are more tight ends on the field, isn't that a good thing for the wide receivers to get things funneled in their direction?

It's like a pro and a con. It's easier to earn a target. All the yards per route numbers are higher, play action targets are better, and at the same time, if you lose four routes per game because they have to get Trey Harris on those, then like you aren't even on the field. So I think it comes out to a wash. I think he's pro uh properly priced. I thought he's a little bit better after the catch maybe than you thought, Josh. I think there's a lot of like kind of Olay stop start uh like kind of jitterbug aspect to that. I like the best days of him is like almost like the Antonio Brown for a half second. The hard part is Antonio Brown stayed healthy for so long. He was so physical. He like was able to withstand things. I think he was more powerful than Vlad Makoni and stuff. So I think Tyler Lockett is I think a pretty reasonable floor for him. I I do think there's like maybe one level above that in terms of like being kind of a focal point of an offense that he can hit, but um he's next to all the guys that you could say that about.

All of them. I want all of them. One final note here from Reeves. Uh Lad Makkey's early down target share last year was basically ident identical to his rookie season, but his target share on third downs was 18.4% and that was down 7% from his rookie year. And that was all Keen Allen stuff. I mean, Keen Allen had like a 35% or something target share on third down. So I I I do wonder who is getting that work because as we saw last year, not just on third downs, but just overall that Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Wadd were both top 13 in yards per route. Not bad for this offense. All right, we move on to Roma, the ninth pick of the sixth round on Yahoo right now. That is wide receiver 28. And he actually finished last year, I think I did the math correctly, as wide receiver 23 in points per game. Certainly doesn't fit the narrative of him this off seasonason. So Matt, leading into that, people on every single platform are certain that Luther Burton will outperform Robo Dunay. Are you?

No. I mean, I think the gap between these two guys like doesn't make any sense to me. And a lot of the And I, by the way, I will not participate in the culture war of like you have to hate one and love the other. All right. I I like both of these players. It's unfortunately just like the ADP market right now does kind of force you to make a really hard choice on Luther Burton when he's in that group of receivers that we really really like and Dunay just goes so much later and I just think a lot of the reasons to fade Roma Dunay just don't really stand up to merit to me. Um, you know, number one great great player. I mean, I think he is really he's not been perfect. I'm not going to say he's been blameless. Like he had really big problems at the catch point last year, which based on his prospect profile and even based on his rookie season were kind of shocking to me. Um, you know, he just made a lot of mistakes there. And I do think the injury compounded that. A conversation I had with him in February of this past year where he had talked about it was less of like the physical problems coming back from the injury and like he didn't feel as much, you know, like himself and from a movement perspective. it was more about like the timing and rhythm within a very timing and rhythm detailed-based offense that he kind of felt like he fell out of rhythm with the quarterback and that was where some of those contested catch issues even got worse once he got back from the injury. So that's that's something that he like you got to start there and say he needs to just be better at the catch point period. End of story, no question about it in year three. That being said, like as from a separation standpoint, he's unbelievable. like this guy gets open open especially against press man coverage and there's just no question that he's the best receiver on the roster doing that and he definitely was a little bit worse like I don't love to split up the numbers you know but I I have done it a decent chunk this year for some of these guys because there is like context worth pointing out here he was definitely better before the injury which tracks with the production too when he was incredibly uh productive to start the year like that's one of the things I I I find a little bizarre that people like well Ben Johnson inherited Roma Dunay Yeah, he inherited Roman Dunes and then proceeded to run his entire passing game through Roman Dun in the first eight weeks of the season before he suffered a foot fracture. So, um he's just such a tantalizing talent, can sink and separate in the intermediate area and like what number one receivers are doing in the NFL right now. He's not going to get the same like Mickey Mouse touches and like create a touch stuff that Luther Burton will because Burton's much much better with the ball in his hands. I think objectively better in that area, but like making explosive plays like Ben Johnson is all about making explosive plays. And Roma Dunay is not running like a bunch of nine routes either. He's not he's not this sacrificial exceiver. He's moving around pre- snap running as the Z receiver and running these big breaking outs and digs. That's where the most of his route tree is. And that's what that's like the first read stuff in this offense. So, um you know, again, you don't have to hate Burden to like Adun, but Adun goes too low. like people are way too down on him based on his film last year when he was healthy.

I have a dunes ranked ahead of Luther Burton. I feel good about that and I saw the same thing with Rome is this is not like some static exceiver nonsense that we're frustrated about. Like he's in motion running at full speed. He's really fast for somebody as big as he is could tap the brakes and and break either way. Uh he's not going to be like Mr. Stop start in terms of after the catch like you said. That's totally fine. I think that he's got the most potential to be dunking on players versus like uh Luther Burden. And I thought the two biggest things were, like you said, the catch point stuff is just like has to get better, but hopefully that gets better. And then the catchable ball rate slash kind of chemistry and zone coverage kind of all that blends together there. He was 73rd out of 79 wide receivers in catchable ball rate over the last two seasons. That comes at the six highest average depth of target. I think a lot of that's just because he's not going to get some of the screens. He's like that intermediate guy but put into advantageous situations and his numbers were actually pretty good. Wide receiver 18 in usage, wide receiver 22 in targets per game.

He just has to be more efficient and I think a lot of that is just like Caleb Rome got to get on the same page. Make those catch the ball, you know, catch the freaking football. That would be nice. But we're talking about a top 10 pick here. I think that he's pretty well-rounded. uh as long as he kind of makes these kind of improvements. So, he's one of the guys that going into this I had like the most questions about and then after sitting there and watching it, I'm like I can really see the the vision where he's he's like multiple rounds too low. I think he can be like priced in the second or third round next year after a huge season. I still want Coulson Level the most, but Roma Dun is a really good player.

Yeah. Not just reddraft. I think Roma Dunce is an awesome dynasty buy right now because his stock might not be any lower than it is right now because of all the focus on Luther Burton and Coulson Lovelund as secondyear players. I'm with you. I mean his body control for his size I really think is sensational. So smooth on those easy outbreakers and post cuts and everything. It's just like almost every single fingertip catch after the buy just went against him, you know? and then over a quarter of his pass attempts in his direction over the final eight games were just purely inaccurate. This does leave me with a question and it might be an unanswerable question. Uh I'm going to ask it anyways. Five touchdowns over the opening four games, then the by-week and then obviously we know about what the left foot stress fracture and planer fasciitis and everything. Leaves me this question, Matt. Does the end of season performances matter more than the beginning when we're just talking about fantasy players at all? because I feel like that determines where players end up going in our final like the taste in our mouths from them. And should it like should it?

I mean, I've seen other folks do the research on this, so like maybe I'm speaking out of turn, but I don't think there's been any correlation between like how you finish the season and like what happens next year. Um, certainly sometimes like I obviously the the offense is fundamentally different now that Burton and Lovelin have both emerged. Um, so I don't know that like like Roman Jun pacing to be like a top five fantasy receiver like he was last year. That was probably always going to take a step back once we introduce these two young and really talented players. Um, but yeah, I do think that the the way the season ends always carries way too much weight as we're projecting into the next year when like the full body of work, especially when we're talking about a guy that did suffer a serious injury and I don't want to just yada yada through the injury either. you know, he makes the new new normal comment or whatever. And like it's just funny, you know, if he never says that, we probably are not sitting here having like that that conversation at all when like Tedo McMillan, no one talks about his foot injury and he like missed a ch a huge chunk of the offseason with it. Um, but yeah, man, I I I think that it's definitely worth investigating that part of it and and the way the season ended, but you know, still got back out there. I think still made a couple of plays in the playoffs. You know, Luther Burton didn't make any plays in the playoffs. So, um, I do think that's just worth noting like this is a really good player attached to a good off. I actually think the way I've thought about this and I'm curious if you guys feel the same way or think this makes sense. I think if you are if you want to really bet on Caleb Williams not getting any better, like he's just what he was last year, which is not the bet that I want to make. I think that does lead you into Luther Burden a lot because he's gonna get like the easy button touches and stuff and you know Roman Dun will still continue to have this like low catchable ball rate and all this stuff because he's just running the big boy routes like he's running the harder stuff.

At the same time, I also think that there's just no way that Luther Burton can have the role that he did last year. He won't be used that way. So then a lot of the kind of per route stuff is is going to change and everything. So it's a really interesting discussion between these two guys. But yeah, if Williams doesn't improve at all, then yeah, you can do the the create a touch gimmicky things, but that's not what this offense wants to do and it's not the way they used their players last year.

Last note I had in the red zone, it was Coulson Love and Roma Dunay over 20% target share. Luther Burton was at 8% and then if you look at those targets that he got for for Luther Burton, 30% of those were screens. So like in terms of just like normal drop back throwing the ball into the end zone, it was very rarely Luther Burden last obviously that's as a rookie, but to me that makes sense. Roman Dun, Coulson, Leland, like have proven players that they can dunk on you if you look at their college tape. So, I I do think that the upside belongs to those two guys the most. Like you said, Matt, if Caleb, you know, throws more catchable targets. Like it was just shocking how many times he just straight up missed guys.

Yeah. Yeah. Totally. Uh just on Yahoo, Luther Burn is going as the ninth pick of the fifth round and Rome is the 10th pick of the sixth round. So again, we have over a round difference between the two. All right, next. Marvin Harrison Jr., sixth pick of the seventh round at this point as wide receiver, 31. He finished last season as wide receiver 40 in points per game. Matt, I've known you for a very long time, like over a decade, maybe like two decades nearly at this point. It's crazy.

Yeah.

I would not call you an optimist in regards to everything. I'm just being here. Uh, but with receivers, we'll unpack that later. Uh, I I'd say you typically lean on the optimistic side. So, does that even apply here to Marvin Harrison Jr.?

Yeah, I I will admit like I'm a pretty full-blown like Marvin Harrison Jr. apologist while also admitting that he has not obviously been the player that he was supposed to be. Like I think you can hold two opinions in in your head at one time and that he's been a disappointment relative to he was the best prospect I think I've evaluated since the since Jamar Chase. Uh he went fourth overall. His name is freaking Marvin Harrison Jr. and I think he's been a disappointment relative to those expectations. Well, he's also not as bad as what he has been painted to be. And like some of that is his relationship with the the quarterback was not, you know, with Kyler Murray. Just to me, like and I said this to to Nate Ty on 301 like the very beginning of this past season. I was like Drew Petting, Kyler Murray, and Marvin Harrison Jr. They just like all need to get away from each other. Like they could I actually don't think that you got your wish. Well, now they're all away from each other obviously, which is we'll see how that goes. Um, but like I don't think that Ping's offense was like abhorrent or offensive. And I don't think like Kyler Murray is a, you know, total clown, but they just didn't all work together. I think they will find more success away from each other for a variety of different reasons, but I think obviously Harrison's role, it's it's just very traditional static exceer. I think he is still like a misunderstood player for for kind of like the guy he's supposed to be. he can have like some real dunk on you exceiver moments, but like we we launched a new player comparison tool on the reception perception site this off seasonason. And if you go back and look at Marvin Harrison Jr.'s rookie year when he was a little bit healthier than he was this past year where he had just a ton of weird stuff going on, he has like three Calvin Ridley comps, you know, in his top comparables because he's more of that like nuanced route runner and makes mistakes at the catch point just like just like Calvin does at times. Um, so yeah, I think like that's kind of the more of the player he should be and I do think he'll be better deployed in this offense, but like flat out people think that he can't separate or he doesn't get open. Totally disagree. Strong separator in particular areas while there are still some areas for growth as well.

I thought last year he was stacking guys vertically more often than he did as a rookie. Uh, I thought like speed wasn't necessarily like the thing that was kind of holding him back. It was I mean the drops were just like they were like really badly timed. some of the most hilariously bad drops here. I mean, the the one week four against the Seahawks terrible was just like the d like the the most ridiculous drop of the entire football season. And by the way, I think he kind of and he even said something like this recently where he says like, "Yeah, I don't even look at the positives. I only look at the negative." I'm like, there's like something to that, you know, with that whole the way that game played out for him. So, that's something to keep in mind.

There was like some like open like I don't know if the sun was in his eyes drops where like he was like standing there and like just like dropped the football. It was it was just a mess at the catch point uh with him. Once again, he's way too good to be doing that. I'm assuming that that stuff's going to get better. He's going to catch the ball cleaner than that. I see it the same way.

I think he does create separation. I don't think that he's like some superstar in the making. I think he's going to end up being a really nice football player. I think that you can throw him at the exceiver and survive if you want to play in like the traditional role. I do think there's more that he can do there.

At the same time, career 1% screen rate for him. I'm not sure if he's like so like jitter buggy that you have to be like throwing him the ball tackles in his career according to PFF. That's it. That's that's the ultimate holdup is he's going to be a better real life receiver than a fantasy player. Especially when you have Trey McBride who's a complete alien working over the middle and like you should be throwing that guy the ball. And then now this year now you have Jeremiah Love.

So I think after doing all this I was like he's a nice player. Like no doubt about it. He's a nice player and I'm concerned by the offense. The quarterback talent is so much lower than his skill competition. Michael Wilson's a real player now. Jeremiah Love is going to get the ball at a time Trey McBride where I'm still coming out of this. I'm like I wanted to like him more, but I just don't see like the gimme stuff really applying to him enough to like overcome the fact that he's been the wide receiver 40 uh this last season or two. It's got to be the most times we've or like the highest ranked fantasy players in ADP for a team that is projected to win three and a half games. It's not gonna end well. Like it's just it's not going to end well at all. It's not going to end well.

And yet at the same time, and Josh, your um you know, accusations here about me not being an optimist, they're gonna you're going to fly in the face of what I'm about to say. I really think like Laflur's offense from a schematic standpoint is gonna do a do so much good for all of these guys. Yeah. And I mean just like the complete lack of motion, especially motion at the snap for these players. I mean never like that's that never in the like that's fine. The Cardinals offense is just like under petting was pretty traditional, but it's pretty traditional for like what was going on in the NFL 10 years ago. And now you got, you know, like what I think Lafleur is going to be able to do for these guys just to blur the line between like when Marvin Harris Jr. was an ex receiver for this team the last two years. It's like yeah, he was an receiver like outside boundary on the ball. Like that's it. But even just getting a guy like shoot they had Greg Dorch on the roster like like what Jimmy Horn Jr. was doing for like the the Panthers with Tedo McMillan last year where he's still the outside on ball receiver but he's you know cutting across behind him and and creating leverage for Tedoa to break inside like that that that stuff will happen this year in this offense which it's going to make it a cool like NFL pro watch it back on film offense but I mean obviously unless Jacobe Brassette is just going to run back the tank commander stuff from last year it's going to be tough for a team that is projected 32nd and is favored in zero games to open the season. Uh zero.

This team has on Yahoo on Yahoo a second round pick and Trey McBride a round two three turn pick and Jeremiah Love. I just mentioned the Marvin Harrison Jr. is a seventh round pick and then Michael Wilson's an eighth round pick. Yeah, that's like Michael Wilson's good. Like he's good. He mogged Marvin Harrison Jr. at the end of last I mean, I I know Marvel wasn't playing, but like just in terms of production and overall, again, final taste in our mouth, uh, yeah, I think you could say that how Michael Wilson ended the season was the most impressive a Cardinals wide receiver has looked over the last two years. Um, which honestly made me even more angry because my whole thing, you know, with with this whole situation was like, why is it always just Michael Wilson at Z and and Marvin Harrison at X? when Michael Wilson can very clear like again you go look at the comps for him it's all like T. Higgins like ex receivers and stuff like that just so I I and I think they used more interchangeably here but yeah sorry sorry to cut you off but god this is that was so that almost it was so frustrating because I like Michael Wilson and they just completely they but then you talk about like Marv when he was in the game he was like target mogs Michael Wilson it just like it just makes no sense.

Yeah. And look, I would love just for my sanity to have 17 games of Jacobe Brassette, but we're not going to get that. You know, Carson Beck's going to get starts this year. The Cardinal schedule is the Chargers, Seahawks, 49ers, Giants, Lions, Rams, Broncos, Cowboys, Seahawks, Rams, Chiefs, Commanders, and Eagles before their week 14 buy. Um, sweet. It's rough. Yeah, we're going to see Beck and like third round rookies in the fantasy playoffs is like it's just not going to be pretty. By the way, the history of having like three pass catchers in the top 100 is already really bad. Like unless you have like a a truly elite like the Joe Burrow with Tyler Boyd offenses, we're not getting that. Like multiple of these guys are going to bust at ADP. Um I'm really nervous about the Trey McBride stuff in round two. Like I would not I wouldn't touch. Nope. Uh I still I don't think I could recommend Marv even if I went into this. I'm like he's a little bit better than I thought he was after sitting there and just watching him in isolation.

So, here's here's how I've advised like how I'm gonna handle the the Marvin Harrison Jr. situation. If you can if you can't tell, like I'm pot committed to Marv uh like forever forever. So, like if he has a great season this year, I'm going to feel like joy from that regardless. I don't need to sit here for the next month and on on our podcasts now, guys, and tell people to draft Marvin Harrison Jr. in fantasy and then when he doesn't do anything, like they're pissed at me. So, because that's the most likely outcome here. Uh, so yeah, I think if Marv is good this year, we can all just enjoy it. It doesn't need to help our fantasy teams. He is going backtoback in consensus rankings out there from experts. Uh, with Roma and Yeah. every time. Easy. The two could not be more different. And I don't know if you guys agree or disagree. I almost want to take like a mystery box and Carnell Tate above Marvin Harrison Jr. this year. I don't know. Give me another name. I literally have them back to back at like the end of that tier. Yeah. And I'm a little worried Carnell Tate's going to get target mogged by Wando Robinson with the cheapies, but that's a for another podcast.

Just just how the consensus rankings are going, it's Marv, then Carnell Tate, then Alec Pierce, DK Metaf, and then actually brings us to our next name in Brian Thomas Jr. who's the eighth pick in the eighth round over on Yahoo. That's wide receiver 36. He finished last year, as we all know, as the wide receiver of 45 in points per game. You know, one of the questions of fantasy draft season is how are the Jags going to deploy their wide receivers? So for you, Matt, from week 10 on after Jacobe Meyers was added to this roster, where did and does Brian Thomas Jr. fit in that group?

I kind of think we do need to throw out most of, if not all, of Brian Thomas Jr.'s 2025 season due to injuries. You know, uh, and by the way, that's just a theme with like all of these guys. with Marv. I mean, he had appendicitis, a concussion, and then the heel injury. Uh, all of course after Kyler Murray gets benched, classic. Uh, but yeah, I mean, Rome injuries to like some of the guys we haven't even talked about yet. Just tons of injuries. So, it's a theme for this entire class and why I think drafters in fantasy right now just aren't looking at these 2024 receivers when they should be. And Dynasty Bros like should be buying these guys because they've just left a bad taste in everyone's mouth. And that that includes Brian Thomas Jr., But I think if you want to just look at what his season was last year in isolation, like there were a couple of things you even in this fantastic rookie season where we can be honest, he did go crazy in the back half when everybody else was hurt and they were a lost team and M. Jones is throwing passes. That doesn't mean that like he can't produce for Trevor Lawrence, but even in this great rookie season, you could nitpick a couple of things, which primarily was like running quick routes over the middle of the field and beating zone coverage consistently. And those became like two massive issues that defined his entire second season as a rookie. 77% success rate versus zone coverage, which was 38th percentile mark, but for his arc, it's not the worst thing in the world. That falls down to se 69.8% 8% this past year, which is just like a mess for ter in terms of success rate versus zone. Um I I I think that that can get better with health. You know, he said it doesn't hurt to run anymore in OTAAS, which is encouraging. So, it really does come down to the role for him. And that's where I get kind of like I can go both ways on this Brian Thomas Jr. situation because theoretically like if this is a team that's running more heavy personnel, if this is a team that's going to have a receiver rotation, to me like the base case for what's going to happen in Jacksonville this year is going to look very similar to the Green Bay Packers where it's a bunch of guys rotating in and out and they still play heavy personnel and they want to run the football a decent bit. Well, the guy that ends up playing the most there is usually like Romeo Dobs because he was the ex receiver and like BTJ should be the team's ex receiver. And I think we've gotten to a point, and this is partly my fault with because of saying sacrificial exceiver where like people have begun to think like being an ex- receiver is bad. Like no, you want to be you want to have an awesome ex receiver and BTJ theoretically could be that. Even last year while he's having this nightmare season, still solid results as a man press beater, just more so on the vertical plane, not the stuff going over the middle of the field. But um I I think he can still be a really valuable player for Jacksonville in that role. and even exceivers in this offense, you know, if you like Mike Evans in 2024, if he just has Mike Evans's route tree in a Liam Cohen offense, I think that's good enough to not be like a sacrificial player, you know. So, um I I'm actually totally comfortable drafting him in fantasy this year because I think if somebody's going to be a big hit from this room, it's going to be BTJ, but I don't know how many universes that he is that big hit.

Yeah, you kind of are the Robert Oppenheimer of the Sacrificial X wide receiver narrative. Yeah. What have I done? I have. Yeah, I know. Look, look what happened to him and look what happened to you. I mean, here you are. We'll see what happens. We'll see how it goes for me. Go ahead, Aiden. Uh, no spoilers. I haven't seen it yet. Uh, the Okay, dude. Even I've seen Oppenheimer and I haven't seen anything. Oh, go to the movies. It's insane. Uh, I have to watch this tape. The thing with Brian Thomas is he's going to catch the ball cleaner than he did last year. I just think part of the thing was just getting absolutely obliterated, hurt his wrist in the preseason. and that caught up to him. Uh, and but I don't think he's going to have the same role that he had as the rookie season like you guys said just because of the surrounding parts to some of the rotation that could come into play here. So last year he was the wide receiver at 37 in expected points. I think it's a good baseline. Here's the thing where I think could get better for him. I think he can still be a really good player and like outproduce that. And speaking like the Packers guys when you said that I know he's going to play a lot like the Dobs ro like role like on the line of scrimmage but I do think that he can have like a Christian Watson type of season if things go well. He has to get a lot better at that. He's got to play a little bit faster. So some of the notes that I had is last year he only had eight receptions against man coverage. I think that plays in he was just like not himself. The year before that like almost tripled that number and he was winning down the football field. There were some slant wins after the catch which we did not see at all this last season. I just get a little bit concerned that all the manufactured stuff is just like not going to go to him anymore. Uh under five air yards he had three and a half targets two years ago. This last year that was down at 1.3. So screen rate went from 11% down to 1%. I thought he was really good in the screen manufacturer department. I'm just not sure if we're going to get that because Parker W I think Parker's getting it. Yeah, Parker's gonna get a lot of that. They do that stuff with Tutin. Brennan Strange was kind of absorbing not the exact manufactured touches but like in that general parts of the field. Jacobe Meyers can kind of do that thing. Obviously Travis Hunter. So it's kind of the middle ground between the two seasons. I I feel really good that he's going to be way better in isolation. I just don't think that the the role is going to necessarily come with him. Boom bust wide receiver three. Like to me this like a classic fantasy archetype. He he can absolutely outperform this ADP. I mean, when you have and finish with an 18.1 A dot over what, the final seven, eight games of the season, if those hit and you run hot, then yeah, I mean, those are massive points. You're going to have massive weeks on top of it. At the same time, I firmly do believe like we have seen already the best fantasy output from Brian Thomas Jr. in the NFL. And I know we're already entering his year three and that's a very short time in his NFL career, but like what we saw at the end of his rookie season that forced us to draft him at the one-two turn, I just don't know if we're going to see that in this version of the Liam Cohen offense because the room is so stacked and just how they utilized BTJ at the end of last year. And again, it's a small sample. We are working with small samples here, but at the same time, this is the entire supporting cast that's returning on top of actually drafting a tight end in round two that's going to allow them to play more heavier personnel sets. But getting back to it, Brian Thomas Jr. ranked third among these receivers on the team in terms of the targets from week 10 on, 17% of his routes, 21% for Jacobe Myers, 25 and a half percent for Parker Washington. Are you mentioning an 18 AOT a 1.35 yards per route run? 36% of his targets in that span were 20 plus 20 plus yards down the field. I just think like from an environmental standpoint, the crossing routes mill the field that fringe on down the field but are more intermediate is such a focal point for Liam Cohen. And we discussed why, but BTJ was such like a a ne negative in that area of the field that going out and getting Jacobe and now the emergence of Parker Washington and also Britain Strange in that area just makes him like so much lower in that totem pole that he's still going to have routes on this team, but I just think like he's not even close to being a funnel type player that he was and we were hoping to at this point last year.

Yeah, I I think that's right. At the same time, like we just mentioned Harrison and Carnell Tate, like I would take the shot on BTJ over those guys. And I and I like Harrison. I think I might rather have Harrison and Dynasty just on the the chance that they fall into a quarterback in next year's draft, which they probably could. Um, but yeah, BTJ tough. I But at the same time, like if there's a big hit from this room, I think it will be BTJ. But I don't know that there's going to be a big hit from this room because like Travis Hunter is still going to run at least like 20% of the routes, maybe more than that. You know, I I just like it's going to be very rotationheavy base, the whole deal. So, we'll we'll see.

I've been listening to the Jaguars reporters because we have to. It's like the the number one thing between the backfield and the receiver mix for for the all of training camp. They think that Travis Hunter is going to play like infinitely more snaps at corner. And one of the reporters even thinks that like CJ Williams might play more snaps than Travis Hunter and that Travis Hunter is like only going to play a little bit of wide receiver. The more I kind of thought about this, like isn't the simplest answer like Jacobe Myers is like just not nearly as involved. He does some of the sacrificial stuff. We can applaud his blocking stuff and then like we go back to Brian Thomas, Parker Washington at one after another. I don't know if he stays there. He's like, yeah, I I I think that he's just the peak of Brian Thomas and watching Parker Washington. Parker Washington, I think, clears Jacobe Myers. I think that the easy stuff is going to be Jacobe just like takes a backseat. not in terms of like a bunch of playing time difference, but just like where you're dialing things up. I I just I'm hoping that Brian Thomas gets a little bit better. And then I really liked what Parker Washington was doing in like some of the similar stuff that Jacobe Meyers provides.

I I think that's up to Brian Thomas Jr. though, like if if he shows the inconsistencies and the negative plays, then obviously they'll lean more in those two wide receiver sets on the steady Eddie that is Jacobe Meyers. But maybe he has the opportunity to like have that role early on and if he is consistent in it then he does keep Jacobe off the field in those scenarios. Yeah, I mean this is a fascinating one. Also they go through a period of time facing outside corners like Denzel Ward, Patrick Certan, Christian Gonzalez, DJ Turner, Quinan Mitchell, and Derrick Stingley. And we know where Brian Thomas Jun is going to line up a lot. Yeah, that's where he could get sacrif that's where the X can be sacrificial in in those situations. So it's tough.

Yeah. Uh he is still going as the first Jaguars wide receiver on every single platform and in every single ranking out there. He is very close and in the same round as Parker Washington and the Jacob's a round or two later depending on where you're drafting. But yeah, I want to get this right and I want to get the backfield right. Like that is critical. I think league settings really matter for these two between Thomas and Parker Washington. Like the roles are so different that you know full PPR, half PPR, best baseball, not baseball, like that type of stuff matters here.

All right, we got a few more names. We're just shy of an hour. Before you guys go any further, give us a thumbs up. Give us over a thousand likes on this video. That would be generous and helpful. We'll give you a thank you. On top of that, hit a subscribe. Uh, subscribe to Matt's show. It's in the link in the description down below. We have so much stuff coming up between the two of us, collaborating and not. Uh, and you should tune into it all because we're going to give you good information.

All right. Yeah. Speaking of good information, let's talk about Ricky Pieraw. The second pick of the 10th round on Yahoo. That's wide receiver 41. Finished last year as wide receiver 52. Regrettably, I spent all of last summer telling people to draft Ricky Pearl. When he played, you know, he performed there four games. Top 24 scoring wide receiver. He only appeared in nine. So, Matt, I'm here to ask you, should I spend the rest of this summer telling people to draft Ricky Pierce because I really want to? Josh, we're do we're doing it again, man. Um, we're so doing it again. God, there's a range of receivers where it's like Ricky Puraw, Josh Downs, Jaden Reed, and I'm like, can can we just that that's where I almost want to go full boomer and, you know, load up on running backs and just hit those, but they all go kind of in the same range. So, you got to make picks there, which is tough. But, um, anyways, second time we've mentioned Josh Down sneakily on the I know. I mean, you got to do it every It's a running joke. For a reason, baby. Uh, but yeah, Ricky Pearaw, I still can't believe there are people out there that swear this guy's like not a good receiver. They just like don't have eyeballs. They're they're in the spread. They're way too deep in the spreadsheets. Get out of the spreadsheets and and watch the film. Ricky Pieraw, really good player and was productive like when he was healthy for 5 seconds last year. He was third in the NFL in receiving yards for the first three weeks of the season. They can never take it away from us. Um, I mean, Kyle Shan said it, so it was going to work. Damn it, it was going to work. And that was all while last year, my theory on this, and obviously I could be to I could be totally off on this, but like they basically had to cobble together the role that they thought Brandon Aayuka was going to play for this team by essentially having Jennings play too much outside on ball than is is conducive for his skill set. And for Ricky Persaw to be this massive vertical route player, which he can definitely do a strong success rate versus man numbers last year and he wins on those big breaking routes, which is good, but I mean I think if you go back and look at what he was doing as a rookie, he was more off the ball, more in the more in the slot and running game. Yeah, these and the and even before that too like his first game and the film wasn't great because he was coming back from the gunshot injury, the gunshot situation, but like he was running all these like return routes like whip routes like go outside, snap it back inside to give Perty these like big chunk completions over the middle of the field and then there just wasn't almost any of that last year because they had to make him the vertical player because the other option was Jawan Jennings who like Josh, you probably run faster than Jawan Jennings at this point. I don't know. Oh, maybe Hayden runs faster than you'd run like a 476 coming out of Tennessee if I'm not mistaken. That would be that would be the fastest fantasy analyst has run ever. Like I don't care who it is. Just quick sidebar, Roto Pat was certain over like the decade I worked with him that he could clear five seconds. Love you Roto Pat, but every single time that made me jump. That's absurd. That's absurd. I could do it if it wasn't for my bad knee, but that's a separate conversation. Um, anyways, yeah, I think that when you when you just look at Ricky Pierce, like I think he could end up really being more like just a different player at the position this year because they added Mike Evans. So, like Mike Evans just being the exceiver of this offense outside on ball, it's going to allow Ricky Pieraw to do a lot of the big breaking routes, but also just get way more layups than he did last year, which was essentially none.

Yeah, I mean, if you look at his like AOT and how involved he is like the manufacturing department, he's like closest to like Rasheed Shahid, Jordan Addison, Jameson Williams. I think that he has more lateral ability than than some of those guys and he's just like not put in those situations. I think that he's a near lock to have more than five targets per game, which is what he had last year. I he's playing through that season on like one and a half legs. It's It's interesting because I think he's really good at like the vertical intermediate stuff like all like he can really tap the brakes and and hit all the big breaking routes. Yes. Um he's done zero after the catch and like the underneath stuff. He's broken zero tackles according to PFF. Like we got to figure that out. Like he's too good to not be doing that. Sometimes when I watch him like when he gets tackled like he really gets tackled. It's kind of like the Lad Manki stuff. I think he's a tier below Lad Mcconkey athletically. But it is like fascinating to see somebody who you'd think gets involved in that department. Like none of it. And that's, you know, that's a KD thing, that's a Macaffrey thing, that's you can name a bunch of different reasons, but that is like the one glaring weakness in the profile so far. And I think injuries and all that type of stuff could explain some of it.

So Ricky Persol, you mentioned broke zero tackles. Um I've been charting, you know, hundreds of receivers since 2014. There's these are the only guys that have like zero broken tackles in a season that I've charted. There there's going to be some names that we've already discussed and one that we will discuss in a second. Ricky Pieraw, Marvin Harrison Jr. from his rookie season, Adie Mitchell from his rookie season, Josh Palmer, DJ Chalk, Marquez Valdez Scantling, Van Jefferson, and Henry Rugs. So like that's it's a very small group of players. Um and his he went down on first contact on 85% of the players I charted in his rookie season as well. Like he's just like break a tackle Ricky Pieraw challenge is is defin like I would love to see him get more layups than he did last year cuz he didn't get any. But I don't think he's going to be doing much after the catch cuz which is weird cuz he's like a decent kick returner. I think Mike Evans is such a huge win though for Ricky Pierol in that agree. Like it's so obvious when you're watching this 49ers scene and they're somewhat healthy that Kyle loves to move Ricky around and that's only going to be good things for us. You know, he's the one that you get in these full speed motions, these fly motions, getting him into stacks and these free releases. And if that's the case, he is one of these guys to me that you give him separation, he sustains it and can even create it at multiple levels. So, as long as Mike Evans hamstrings stay intact, I think that allows us to have Ricky Pieraw in like the best situation possible for him. Uh, I'm just I can't believe I'm so optimistic for a guy who has like 99 targets in his career so far and and less than a thousand yards through two seasons. I don't want to be of this mindset of, well, he's had these fluke and crazy injuries over these last two years and that's just going to sustain itself because I really do think when it all comes together for this 49ers team, if it ever is again, uh, Ricky Pieraw is just going to be like a massive beneficiary for it because Kyle is exactly the type of play caller I think that's going to get the most out of this styling of a player.

I like all these guys in this range. I I put Ricky Paw a tier above all the guys in this ADP just because I think that his ultimate upside is like he plays every single snap. You know, George KD like we'll see if he's going to play the first month of the season. Like I don't think that's a given uh given when he actually tore his Achilles. Mike Evans has been struggling to stay healthy. He's still pretty dang good football player when he's been out there though. U and then yeah, the CMC stuff like if if he goes down with an injury, then we're talking like 25 30 touches per game going somewhere else. So, I think his like pathway to being like the wide receiver 16 in scoring this year is a little bit clearer to me than a lot of the other guys that have like not done it yet that have flashed and yeah, right now he's he seems good to go. So, just quickly in rankings of where these guys are listed, it goes Michael Wilson, Michael Pitman, Quinton Johnson, Mai Lemon, Ricky Pearl, then Jacobe Meyers, Jordan Madison, Juan Delale Robinson. Oh my god. Yeah. I mean Ricky Pearl over all of those guys. And there's just like if you're trying to hit if you're just trying to get on base in like a baseball format like the Michael Pitman, Jacobe Meyers, you know, boring picks, like I get it. But but yeah, Juan Delu is is in that bucket. But yeah, any Quinton Johnson's fine, but yeah, I would take Ricky Paris over all those guys. Um yeah, his his top two comparables, by the way, uh in the player comparison tool on the site are like two Adam Thielen seasons, which I think like ultimate up and I know that's like white guy to white guy, but I know hey we that input is not in the tool. Okay, makes sense. It does make sense, but like yeah, like kind of flanker slot, runs isn't just a bunny hop receiver, runs big breaking routes. It's I think that's like the best use for him. I agree. Harman. I will say we just appeared on the Ringer Fantasy Football Show for a two-parter. It turned into uh and you were shouted out for that Ricky Pierce saw Adam Thielen because Hiett said he did the drop down and went to skin color and said oh it's it's Jack Bash to the current version of Cooper Cup. I heard that. I heard that on your show today.

Okay, let's talk about Xavier Worthy. I I'm not and am excited for this conversation at the same time. He's going in the 11th round on Yahoo. Simple question for you, Matt. What is Xavier Worthy and what can he be? Yeah, so, let's just be honest. I was lower than consensus on Xavier Worthy as a prospect. I was lower than consensus on Xavier Worthy coming out of his rookie year. At the same time, if I'm going to do the like, hey, we got to give this guy a pass for this, that, and the other due to injuries, we have to be intellectually, you know, consistent here and say that we can give Xavier Worthy a pass for his second season because he got blasted by a teammate that is listed, and I'm going to emphasize listed as 85 pounds heavier than him. and I'm gonna go ahead and actually take the over on the 85 pounds there. Um, so yeah, I think that a lot of, you know, Worthy's second season was just really banged from the start, literally. Um, but you know, it wasn't a good result on on the field. Like he's really struggles to separate. He goes down on first contact all the time. Um, he's not going to be useful against press man coverage whatsoever, which is a problem because the Chief's best receiver is only good against zone coverage. So that's really like a these two guys just should not be on the same team together whatsoever. Uh he's just a is a nightmare in that room because of that. But I mean he's he's not a completely useless player. There are areas where he definitely wins. Like he's good on quick out routes against man coverage. He can win there, but it's just the deep stuff is not has not come together for him mostly because he just is he's just he's just too small.

He's just playing out of position like to me. What's his numbers like on the line of scrimmage? like just sitting there watching and just like he's on the line of scrimmage way too often and he just can't get enough space to like be good and on breaking routes. He's like the perfect 71% snaps outside. Uh he was on the ball which went up from 43% to 53%. Yeah, you felt you felt that. Yeah. To to me he should never be on the ball. Like he should he should never be on the ball. He's 165 pounds. Come on. True. To me, he's the perfect example of like to be a good downfield receiver, you have to be more than fast because these corners at an NFL level, just an average one right now, slow him down to their speed and then they can just play at that and then when the ball is a tight window target, they just play through him and and he can't come up with it. It It's so fascinating to me like just going through this. He caught four of 16 20 plus yard targets this past season, seven of 21 the year before and was only four of 13 on the intermediate receptions during his rookie season as well. Like he really is Hayden to go back to what you were saying, he's like a nine yard and underneath wide receiver so far in his career and that's kind of not how at least I thought he was going to be utilized in the NFL. Yeah, last year was I'm almost willing to throw it com completely out because the type of routes that on the show I know, but this one I feel I think maybe even stronger about because Andy Reid said that they were going to throw him a lot of crossing routes and they said they couldn't do that. They were going to throw him screens. His screen rate dropped like almost to to zero this last year because they knew if he got tackled on that delicate shoulder like he would just be out for even longer than that. And all that said, when Taekquin Thornton's your third guy, like someone's getting jammed like, so who is that gonna be? I I do in the back of my mind, I do wonder, do we just start like closing the gap between Rasheed Rice and Xavier Worthy and the manufactured touches and how you're utilizing them to some degree. I think that would be a smart thing just like, you know, hedging against the entire situation that you have in Kansas City there. Um, but the he has to face more off coverage to win downfield. like that's just kind of the reality. Uh or you have to get him running crossers where I think he's got a little bit better of a chance. But in order to do that, you have to, you know, make that a priority. And I think that they probably were going to do that last year to some extent. The second play of the season before he lost his shoulder was actually a run to Xavier Worthy. It's like you can kind of extrapolate maybe where this thing was going, but it's you have to really speculate here to get excited about Xavier Worthy.

Two things. one uh like you get two beers in me and I would tell you that Cyrus Allen is their fifth round pick is easily the best man coverage receiver on this team Rice. It's not Well, yeah, it's not Rasheed Rice. I mean, Rasheed Rice has a 4.69 average depth of target the last three seasons, which out of 117 receivers that have run 200 or more routes is telling the out of Rasheed Rice this year, though. Cool. Have fun with that. I I actually worry that was this was going to be my second point. I actually worry that if they can if they can credibly run the ball, are they still going to do all the scammy targets to Rasheed Rice and they're going to run the ball better this year? I mean, they were the worst. They he had the lowest AOT and they were the worst run game over the last two years by a decent bit in terms of explosive plays. So, that would be my one worry with Brashy Rice on the field. And it's like the hard part with Rice is like, yeah, it's like there's nothing wrong with it worthy even though it's it's too limited of a skill set to take in the first round of the NFL draft, whatever. But like individually, he's a useful player. Rice is a useful player, but just like the way that them being in the same room together is just a huge problem when they don't have like George Pickkins as the number one receiver or something.

Yeah. And technically, I think you could argue that Travis Kelce is also occupying kind of the same area that another roll c you can't roll cater to three guys. Correct. Correct. But what if Kelsey's not involved in the offense? Like that's what I'm saying. If if Rice scales back a little bit, Kenneth Walker stops working and then all of a sudden like Kelsey like that's where like you can picture like Xavier Worthy being a boom bust flex option wide receiver three which he has not done for a very long part. I think like you can squint and see how things are kind of falling into place for him. But I think anything beyond that like he hasn't shown that he's good enough to to belong in that tier.

Yeah. And look the the one offseason move that this team made in offense was to add Ken Walker. And hopefully that changes the math for them just in terms of coverages. At the same time, you know, the quarterback needs to hit those downfield passes for for that to work. Um, Nicker Colano posted today that in games where Rasheed Rice has played, Xavier Worthy has averaged 2.7 catches per game. not great. Yeah, not great, you know. And then just overall in his career, his three games of reaching 80 yards receiving over 34 appearances. So, yeah, I mean, maybe Ken Walker is how this whole thing is going to change. But if it does change, like as much as I think Rasheed Rice is a linear skill set player, I still think that linear skill set is better than what Xavier Worthy's linear skill set is. But maybe I'm not with that. No, I agree. I agree with that.

Okay, moving on. Jaylen Coker, you texted me. We got to talk about him. 16th round. You have loved Jaylen Coker for multiple seasons since he's entered the NFL and since you got a taste in preseason and everything like that. Why have you been so on board with Jaylen Coker, whereas it even took the Panthers a while to fit him in the starting lineup? I know we're not going to sit here and advocate for him to be drafted on Yahoo, for example, because he's going in the 16th round, but just overall, do you think the public has the correct perception of what Jaylen Coker's talents are? Uh, no. Guy's a stud. like he's he's a great receiver. Uh he's and the only reason the Panthers took forever to do it is one little out of shape at times. You know, you hear the the whispers about that. He needed to get his body right. That's okay. Coming from Holy Cross, all right, they don't have the most, you know, advant I'm not big. Well, speak for yourself. Uh but, you know, I mean, for for Jaylen Coker, he's getting an NFL weight room, whatever. He's got his body right, his his nutrition, you know, that's fine. But like skill set wise, this is the archetype of receivers that are smoking in the NFL right now. Big body, not as he's not like I know he's listed as 6'3, like 215 pounds. He's a little bit lighter than that. He's actually built more like Chris Godwin. Um, and that's kind of the type of player that I think he is like Jacobe Myers is uh like Chris Godwin type. He can be a power slot but can win outside big breaking routes. He's much better against press man coverage than you would think for somebody that is a UDFA that I'm saying is like Jacobe Myers. Meyer's also a good route runner in those areas as well. So, yeah, I think he's just a really, really good player. They got an absolute steal and I think it's actually I'm not going to sit here and like advocate for the the Panthers offense. I know everybody's first retort is the quarterback and I I get that. But these reports about McMillan playing more in the slot and everything I think are legit because one, he can't he can almost can't play fewer snaps in the slot than he did last year. 15% last year. Yeah, it was 107th uh or 101st out of 117 receivers with 200 plus routes last year. So, yeah, he he he's towards the bottom. He's not quite in the George Pickins, Rashad Baitman zone, but like he's pretty much just an X. That's going to change this year. A big part of that is because Coker can actually play on the outside. like watch him late in the season like line up against man coverage as an ex receiver and stack big oh the Rams game big wins on go routes and they draft Chris Brazzle who's just like the perfect sacrificial receiver at least to start like get him on the Alec Pierce path where he's just clearing space earlier and then see what he can be by you know year four or whatever and you know legette's going to do his thing every now and again maybe uh but I think they're one of these teams that actually could go against the trend because they have these big bodied receivers and be more spread. Now, I wish they didn't have two backup offensive tackles uh necessarily, but yeah, that's a part of the the issue there. But yeah, I think they could be one of these teams that go against the trend, spread things out, get these three receivers on the field a lot, and I think Coker is going to get a lot more targets than people think.

I think the fact that Koker can win on the outside is like the reason why T-Max's going to go in the slot this year. I mean, it's like perfect, perfectly timed for Coker to be breaking out as they drafted Tedella, I thought his film was was pretty legit. He he's one of these interesting guys where his catch radius is pretty big and then you're like he's not like blowing by guys like with like straight line speed but then like you go look he had a 42 and a half inch vertical which is absurd. So he's got this like nice catch radius working over the middle. I think Jacobe Myers is an excellent comp there. Just like to remind folks nine for 134 in a touchdown in the playoff game. He played 88% of the snaps there. For a lot of his career, he was kind of in that 66ish percent snap rate. In those games, he averaged nine and a half half PPR points, which would have been like wide receiver 34. There's no way he's not playing 85, 90, 95% of the snaps this year. Like, they have to do that. The other two guys, Brazil and Legette, those guys will rotate as the wide receiver three. And I think the best of Bryce stuff is the spread amount stuff. Like, that's how I would orchestrate this thing. if you can't block him up, get the ball out quickly, let Bryce throw these huge lollipops towards the sideline like right as the ball is snapped and like I think Coker can come down with some of those and obviously Tedoa can too. So I I see how the offense is kind of coming together here. I think that Coker should be drafted in reddraft leagues. I think

There's enough here, and if T-Mac did go down with an injury, I think he's skilled enough that he would be an every-week starter. Uh, because just the rest of the offense, like those guys are just like not target earners. So I think that he's like a good, like handcuff in redraft.

Uh, and then in basketball, I do think that he's good enough to like have random spike weeks. >> And new play caller here. And Brad Aidzik and Hayden, you and I have talked about this at length this summer. This team, despite having the same coaching staff, has still struggled to start seasons of how to build a correct passing attack. And I think from the jump this year, they're finally going to attack down the field. Um, again, people have their thoughts on Bryce Young, but if you look at the underlying numbers, uh, he is one of the more efficient downfield throwers in the league. And you see that in that Rams game, like a lot of those are really nice throws. And I think they're going to lean into that from the start with these bigger bodies that they have. And T-Mac can do that, and Jaylen Coker can definitely do that. And like he was going to be in three wide receiver sets to start last year, and then as soon as they trade away Adam Thielen, he gets injured in training camp, and then, you know, things have gotten better as the wide receiver room. Hunter Reenfro was their slot receiver, and like, no disrespect to Hunter Refro, made a, made a big-time comeback, but like that is the slot only of slot only of all time. So yeah.

>> And then when Hunter's in there, you know, then you can't move T-Mac in the slot because Hunter Renfro can't play anywhere else. So like I bet T-Mac plays like 30% of the snaps in the slot. So it's doubling what he did last year. Let's not go crazy and start calling him a big slot out there and just >> overemphasize. Like Drake London. Yeah, I mean, like Drake London. They were the same family of receivers. I think London's a little bit better and has a higher ceiling. Like did better as a prospect. But yeah, like London was 39% snaps in the slot in 2024 on passing plays. That's good enough.

>> And when they're in the slot, the ball is basically going to them. >> It's go. Yeah, I >> I'm excited for Jaylen Cooker. Really fun player, really good player. Uh, make some difficult grabs and then make some highlight real ones on the outside. Okay, let's end this episode with some three quick hitters. Uh, just because for us sickos that have been drafting best baseball all summer, these guys are kind of relevant. Uh, first is Adnai Mitchell. Matt, chances that he's the second highest scoring wide receiver on the Jets this season?

E >> Even. I mean, I think it's like even between him and uh, he is the, he's the only receiver in the NFL. Uh, James Co jokes about this, like every receiver I'm like, "Yeah, he could be better off the ball. He could be better in the slot. He's like the only receiver I never want to see him in a slot. I never like, just like what he should be what George Pickkins was last year. The farthest away from the ball. You're doing your own thing because I know he gets kind of painted as this great separator. Super overrated as a separator because he can't beat zone coverage, but like these one-on-one situations on like just basically four routes, slam control out, you know, nine, he can be good on those routes, but that's about it.

>> No more notes than that for me. That's >> Hayden. Is there a difference to you though in in your mindset with him where you know at the start of the summer on underdog we were drafting him in the 18th round and now because we hate all those picks basically from the 14th round to the 18th round now he's a 15th round pick. Like, is there any change in your wavelength on that?

>> No, I I think that's that's fair. Like that's where I I would be ranking him. Um, I I think that Omar Cooper, the are they going to trust him in two wide receiver sets? Because I think they are going to use two wide receiver sets a lot because they have, you know, Mason Taylor as a as somebody. Whoever is going to be out there in two wide receiver sets is going to be the one that outscores the one that's not in them. So, is Omar Cooper going to push Adnai Mitchell? Not in three wide rece. It's the two wide receiver set stuff and like, we'll see. Omar Cooper is kind of like, I think probably best in the slot, did play some flanker. Like he's kind of in between, and I think it's just up to him, just like to push Adai Mitchell. And and best ball, I'm sure Mitchell will have a couple 40-yard touchdowns this year, but the volume's not going to be there consistently, obviously.

>> Matt, I don't even know if you charted this guy, but I have to ask because this is the bleakest wide receiver room >> in the NFL. What should our thoughts be on Malik Washington?

>> Oh god.

>> I I haven't charted Malik Washington yet, but I did like him as a prospect. Um, no, that's okay. I've done like I've done a couple games. I don't have a full profile up on on him yet because uh he will and he but he will be on the site because I did like him as a prospect and I'm just curious. But for the most part, I think he's he's like been a create a touch guy who um can win against zone coverage at times, but I don't think there's like a high high ceiling here. But again, did like him as a prospect. Uh, he showed he could beat man coverage at UVA, so that was exciting. And I think he should be better with the ball in his hands than he's been so far. So I do like Malik Washington. I'm holding out like a little bit of hope for him, but I mean, my god, the Dolphins just >> right. I mean, >> what a what a disaster.

>> That that's why I asked because of what this wide receiver room is at this point. And like other than Chris Bell, is he the most exciting name from that group? Like I I have found myself literally getting to drafts and end >> of best baseball leagues and saying, I don't want to draft any of these guys. Why not just take a shot on Malik Washington instead of Jaylen Tolbert and 22 Atwell, you know?

>> Yeah, don't take, never take 22 Outwell or Jaylen Tolbert. Like, come on.

>> It's Greg Dolich for me. You guys can have receivers. Yeah.

>> Uh, someone I was taking in that range, Matt. And I mean, this guy might have climbed the most in the last month than any other player is Ryan Florenoi of the Dallas Cowboys. He's a very fun player.

>> Yeah, >> he has climbed from round 18 up to the middle of the 14th round. Matt, if this was, I don't know, the 2011 NFL season, uh, I think we could really get excited about Ryan Florenoi as like a slot type player.

>> Uh, I just fear and I know that he really won't have any fantasy relevance unless one of these Cowboys wide receivers are sidelined for a long period of time, but as soon as he is, he will headline the waiver wire column or video for every single person out there.

>> No. Yeah. Name to know because of that. And uh Dynasty Wise is is a good, you know, I stuck him at the end of my benches all last year because, um, you know, shout out, I hate to give producer Colin any credit, but I'm going to give him credit here that he was on me all last year, like, you got to chart Ryan Floy, the guy's really good. And I was like, Colin, he's a Cowboys fan, I'm not charting Ryan Fenoy. And then Nate said to do it, so I was like, all right, I'll listen to Nate, so I did. And like, he's legit. Fenoy is legit good. Like he's a, he was a legitimately good player. Can can beat man coverage, can sink and win over the middle of the field. Uh, I actually think his presence as a third receiver sometimes, like what the what these third receivers are and what they do to the top two guys for fantasy for us is definitely more important than what they are in their own right. Even though I think Leno is a legit good player and he would be awesome if either of these two guys weren't on the team. But you got to remember, like last year CD Lamb opened up the season as the Z receiver, not as the slot receiver because their third receiver was the aforementioned Jaylen Tolbert and Kavonte Turpin, who, you know, is a tiny like kick returner. Now that Florenoi has emerged, I actually think that kicks Lamb back into the slot more because Florenoi can win coverage as a Z receiver.

>> I totally agree. He was part of our wide receiver sleepers just for that very reason. Like when Lamb was out, he saw more of the slot stuff, but then at the same time, you saw him on the outside in two wide receiver set looks and he actually held his own as an outside wide receiver. Like Florida,

>> when did you say he when did you say he was like back in the 18th round? Was that

>> uh I think at the start of the summer he was like a 17th or 18th round pick.

>> Yeah, dude. Literally the last video I posted on my YouTube channel uh was like Ryan Feno is a good player. Like peace out, I'm going to Portugal for you know two weeks and I come back and he's like a 14th round pick.

>> He's a 14th round pick. Yes. Yes. That's what happens. That's what happens. Hayden, any closing thoughts here?

>> I had a really good tier of receivers to be buying low on just for injuries just across across the board. I think all these guys have upside. I I think the Ricky Pieraw shot is really good one to take later on. And then I think that you can swing, I would say like Roma Dunce is a really good swing at where he's being drafted. And then I think the Malik Neighbor stuff, if you're drafting for today, I think his ADP is going to go up. But the PUP stuff is a really big deal. Yeah, Rome is the guy for me that I I mean, just he's the one I want most out of this group at cost. I agree with Neighbors and and Maki too. One one other name just to note, like I think Jaylen McMillan took some nice steps at the end of last year against man coverage as a vertical player and at least can be like their X receiver while Ted Hurst gets up to speed coming up from Georgia State. So that's useful for the Mecha Ibuka bags uh as well. But we'll have to see if Keon Coleman can make the video next year. But uh, we'll see.

>> No, the answer is >> I don't like his odds.

>> I do not like his odds. All right, that's going to do it for us. Uh, this is the first episode of our Yahoo era. We have four episodes per week until the season kicks off. At least four episodes per week. Who knows? We might go crazy. Uh, so hit subscribe, join us here. We're so excited to be a part of this amazing team that Matt has now been a part of for years and years and years and has helped build. was a major reason why we wanted to join this Yahoo crew. Um, and if you're new to our channel, we have plenty of other videos already on the channel from earlier in the summer. I mean, sleepers, >> we have Ron Stewart's favorite picks, >> five running backs you would touch with a 10-ft pole. I mean, we've got tons of stuff out there. So, >> go and check it all out. Go and watch another video. And, uh, we'll be back here tomorrow with another one. Matt, thanks so much. Anything you want to plug before we get out of here?

>> Yeah. Uh, Yahoo Fantasy Forecast, you you plugged the YouTube channel several times. Definitely check that out. And receptionperception.com. I got profiles on all these guys. The new player comparison tool where uh, you know, like I said, it's fun. You can get lost on that thing, man. Just playing around a little bit. So, I think people will enjoy it.

>> Awesome. All right, everyone. Up to you guys soon. See

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These 8 Wide Receivers Will Decide Your Fantasy Season

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