Transcription
Very rarely do I have insider information, and very rarely do I have an actual connection to let you in on some really interesting knowledge. But here, with the Quinton Johnson situation, I may or may not have a little nugget for you. But let's go ahead. Let's talk about everything that happened in this game. We will need to go through. We will need to update our rankings, of course, as we do after every week, after every game.
Let's start it off with the Minnesota Vikings. So, coming into this, I'm not sure if y'all are aware. I'm not sure if y'all have just seen what people are saying online. Not saying it's true, but it's what people are currently saying. People are coming out here saying, "Oh, this JJ McCarthy injury is fake." A JJ McCarthy is actually healthy, and they just faked this ankle so they could go out there, they could bench McCarthy. He's not ready. They were embarrassed, and they needed to give him more time. Blah, blah, blah. Who knows how true that actually is.
But I'll tell you one thing. If JJ McCarthy was in 1% the amount of pain that Carson Wentz was in tonight, he'd be in the hospital. I have never seen a quarterback I was going to, I, I've never seen a quarterback clearly show how much pain they are in every single play. Every single play, Carson Wentz got up screaming in agony, as if he was passing a kidney stone, doing God knows what. And I would assume we get JJ McCarthy back this next week. Like, there, there's, if they are faking this McCarthy injury to any extent, McCarthy is not as injured as Carson Wentz is. Or Carson Wentz just wants everybody to know, hey, I'm not normally this bad. I'm just, I'm just hurt. I'm in pain. Regardless of the situation, obviously Carson Wentz was no, no bueno, and hopefully McCarthy can come in next week. Hopefully McCarthy can actually save this.
Going over to the running backs, of course, Jordan Mason does absolutely nothing. And it's the Aaron Jones show. Aaron Jones is out there for the vast majority of the snaps. My question to y'all, and let me know in the live chat what y'all think with this, is how much of this was the actual game environment in which you did have the Minnesota Vikings trailing this game from start to end? And typically, what I was going to be expecting, say, coming into this, was it was going to be a 50-50 backfield split between Jordan Mason and Aaron Jones. Aaron Jones was going to be the running back that was getting usage on third downs, where Jordan Mason was the first and second down guy. So obviously, if the game gets out of hand, if you have the Los Angeles Chargers boat racing the Minnesota Vikings, it is going to just be Aaron Jones over and over and over again. So, I, I probably am fine nuking Jordan Mason in the ranks. I had him in RB30 before this, and I'm fine moving Aaron Jones up. But I do think like, while they probably belong in the same tier, like, if, like, here's the thing with these two running backs, probably neither of them are startable unless the other guy were to go down. If they were splitting the backfield 50-50. Like, realistically, I think I may rather have like, Trevion Hitter and RJ Harvey just as handcuffs, because like, I think really, you look at this entire tier of RBs, everybody in the F tier that we have, whether it's Walker, Rashad White, Isaiah Pacheco, Trevian Henderson, RG Harvey, Aaron Jones, Jordan Mason, this is the range in which you cannot start any of them unless you are under the most desperate of circumstances. But if their backfield mate were to get injured, all of a sudden they're auto starts. With Trevian Henderson, if Ramadri Stevenson were to go down, he's a top 24 running back in my rankings. With RJ Harvey, if you were to have an injury to JK Dobbins, he's a borderline top 15 running back in my rankings. With Kenneth Walker, he's not startable, but if you were to have Zack Sherman go down, he's a borderline top 10 running back in my ranks. Rashad White's not startable with healthy Bucky Irving. But if Bucky Irving's down, Rashad White, hell, in my rankings this week's a top 10 running back. I think that's both where Aaron Jones and Jordan Mason belong, where they're not startable unless you were to have one of the other guys go down in said backfield.
Now, going over and looking at the wide receivers, they were doing anything they could to just force the ball in the direction of Jordan Addison. Just quick little screens, quick little slants, just get the ball in his hands. Saved Addison's day from a fantasy perspective. Again, you would much prefer the other elite wide receivers. And we actually already had it ranked this way. We already had Justin Jefferson wide receiver six. We have Puka, JSN, CD Lamb, Jamar Chase, a Monroe St. Brown all ahead of Justin Jefferson, because what do all these quarterbacks have that Jefferson doesn't? Good offenses. So, except I guess Jamar, but I mean, hell, one guy is just a different level. Then looking at Addison, Addison scores the receiving touchdown. Does something for my basketball teams, but in reality, do I think that Addison's a must-start wide receiver? No. I think he's definitely a wide receiver two, flex play consideration. I am wide receiver 29, right behind guys like Brian Thomas, Jaylen Wadd, Keenan, Quinton Johnson, Devont Smith, and oh, the big Q. I'm sorry, what we're going to have to do to you later on in this video, my friend. But I'm not moving Addison into my rankings. TJ Hawkinson, I dropped him last week or two weeks ago, whenever the hell it was. I told you all this for Hunter Henry in my own league. So I had TJ Hawkinson ranked tight end 16 in our rest of season ranks. I don't necessarily think that we are going to have to change that either. We probably just go ahead and leave him there.
All right, let's talk about the interesting stuff. Let's go over to Los Angeles, the good offense, the team that was actually out there and able to produce. And y'all know I have an attachment to this offense. I stream underdog basketball drafts every single day in the offseason, at least after the NFL draft to NFL kickoff. It's honestly kind of my favorite thing to do. Those are my favorite live streams, are those underdog basketball drafts. And I went all in on one player this offseason in particular. He had an ADP of wide receiver. Off top of my head, I don't know if it was 74 or 79, but it was in the 70s, and we went all in on Quinton Johnston. And honestly, in an underdog basketball draft, you go all in on a player like that, and he gives you two good weeks at wide receiver 79, the pick was worth it. So, he's already done everything I could have ever asked for him, but I was hoping that he was going to be able to come out of hell. I even thought that going Quinton Johnson on underdog pick 'em high or lower 56 and a half receiving yards wasn't a bad idea. Shows how stupid I am. Shows that I'm never going to be able to get these underdog pick 'em rights. And I'd say that, uh, I don't have much faith in you, but if you have faith in you, if you're a believer in yourself, um, you can go over and you can check out these picks on Underdog Fantasy for this weekend. Code Flock will get you $100 added to your account after you play your first five. Underdog Fantasy is the number one sports app in the app store because they currently have the best promos in the industry. $100 with code Flock after you play your first five. Plus, you'll get that free Jordan Love pick. Higher, lower, half a total yard as well for the Sunday game. And you'll get free questions that you can ask in these live streams. And I'm live streaming every single night until the end of the season with promo code Flock. Links in the live chat, links in the description and comment section.
But here's the thing that, well, let's first talk about quarterback before we get to Quinton Johnson. Um, Justin Herbert, where do we have him beforehand? Do we have to update his ranking? No, I don't have to update his ranking. We had him QB1. Not an every week starter for you, but in good matchups you put him in, and in bad matchups you bench him. I think that he stays there. If you wanted to move Justin Herbert over Caleb Williams based off this really good performance, you can. As I do want to point out that Joe Alt was back in this game. So obviously that was very exciting.
Now, going over and looking at what we have with our next position. Kamani Vidal was a very nice play. We were talking about this in the live stream before the game for a multitude of reasons. One, because Joe Alt was back, so all of a sudden this offensive line was going to be better. Two, with Kamani Vidal, more importantly, you had no Naji, you had no Hampton, and you had no Hassan Haskins. So there was literally nobody to contend with. So he stepped in behind a better offensive line with even less competition than he already had. So Kamani Vidal was a very easy start. Not only does he have 117 rushing yards and the rushing touchdown, but he looked good while he was doing it. It wasn't just like, oh, okay. Um, we were looking at a running back that was just picking up eight yards at a time, then he would get hit and he would fall down. No, like he was getting hit on some of these runs three yards behind the line of scrimmage. He'd shake one tackle, then get to the line of scrimmage, shake another tackle, and then end up picking up four or five yards. Like, Vidal looked great. And realistically, this next week, if you have no Haskins, if you have no, um, Hampton, he's probably right there back to being a must-start player. And for that reason, I'm fine moving Kamani Vidal into that tier with the guys like Harvey, Aaron Jones, Jordan Mason, etc., etc., of like, hey, if the other guy in their backfield's down, you can go ahead and start him. Like, we don't exactly know when Hampton's going to be back. This was his third game missing. He is on the IR, so he has to miss next week. And then, so he's eligible to return in two weeks, but they initially had told us, hey, he's going to be missing more than four. So don't expect him to come back in that fifth week. Um, so Kamani Vidal, probably an easy start this next week. But if Hassan Haskins is good to go, I'm not saying Haskins going to be the lead back. We are so clearly wrong with that with the waiver wire video. Um, Kamani Vidal will be a must-start running back kind of regardless this next week against the Tennessee Titans. I would say like Haskins maybe could come through and he could have 30% of the backfield. Kamani Vidal has 70%. And I don't think Vidal is a super talented running back by any means still.
Now, going over to the wide receivers, Lad McConkey. I hate to say it. I hate to admit it. I'm very biased, but he is the wide receiver one in this offense. Now, if you go ahead and you look at my rest of season rankings coming into this, we had Lad McConkey already as the wide receiver one in this offense. But at this point, hell, I think we need to move Debo Samuel just down in general with the Jalen Daniels injury. But regardless, at this point, how the hell could I look you in the eyes and tell you with Lad McConkey performing the way that he has? Cuz two weeks back when Quinton Johnson missed, you had Lad McConkey actually with a massive blow-up game. Last week, the blow-up game wasn't crazy, but he had 15 targets. And then in this week, he has, he looks pretty, he just looks damn good every time he touches the ball. Like realistically, I would rather have Lad McConkey over AJ Brown. Lad McConkey versus Nico Collins, Rome Priesnt, Davante Adams. If you wanted to move Lad ahead of these wide receivers, by all means, you do it. I'm going to have them in this tier. I'll sleep on it. We'll reevaluate tomorrow. But for now, I'm going to have Lad McConkey at wide receiver 15.
Now, looking at the other wide receivers here, we had Keenan Allen scoring about eight and a half points. Keenan Allen was our wide receiver 26 coming into this. If you really do think that, um, you are going to have say, Lad dominating targets, and here's the issue, is the issue is Gadsden. That's the issue. Then Keenan Allen realistically probably does need to fall. I had probably at this point move him behind some of these names like Brian Thomas and Jordan Addison.
So here's the thing that happened with Quinton Johnston tonight. And I know a lot of y'all are like, "Okay, this is weird." Obviously, you have the NBA stuff going on where, um, players in the NBA are betting on their unders, then going out there and faking an injury at the end of the first quarter, blah, blah, blah. Did something like that happen with Quinton Johnston? Let me be real with you. All right, so y'all know I went all in on him at about wide receiver 79 this offseason. We've already made a lot of money because of him. Thank you very much, sir. You did your service. And Quinton Johnston knows how important he is to us. We sent out this tweet earlier this season when we got engaged, and we are the number one team in the Flock League. Sent out some engagement pictures, said already the best football season ever. It's got 4.1 million views. Obviously, Quinton Johnston saw it. Um, regular engagement pictures, me sitting at the top of the league standings in the Flock League, and then Quinton Johnston as the wide receiver seven that year. So, I have a personal connection with Quinton Johnston. And what was going down this week in the Flock League? Oh, what was going down this week in the Flock League is, oh, guess who played against Quinton Johnston? So, all that happened is I called up my boy, the Big Q, and said, "Hey, man. I know this game against the Vikings is important to you, but we got bigger fish to fry. I need to cash in a favor, and I need you to tank this game for us so I can win my fantasy matchup this week because the team of destiny is on a war path." And he so kindly obliged. Now, am I gonna be calling it? Okay, obviously I'm joking. Let's talk about where he actually ranks. Game freaking sucked. At zero points, Thomas, the editor, had texted me saying, "Hey, I didn't get to see the game. Did Quinton Johnston even play?" I was like, "Oh, yeah. Sadly, he was out there. He was running some cardio. He was staying in zone two, keeping his heart rate low, not doing much more than that." But at this point, I have T. Higgins and Stefon Diggs on my team. If I was called by the Quinton Johnston owner and they said, "Hey man, I would love to trade you Quinton Johnston for T. Higgins." I would go, "What the hell are you talking about?" At this point, I'd rather have Xavier Worthy over him. I think we move Quinton Johnston down to wide receiver 35.
Lad McConkey has looked do, and here's the main issue that we have. He's the big-bodied, like athletic field stretcher that's picking up big plays at the beginning of the season. And you know what really just happened? Freaking Gadsden came through and he's taken that role. Incredible performance right out the gate. He gets there. Five receptions, 77 receiving yards, and the receiving touchdown. So early in the year when Quinton Johnson was performing well, you didn't have a tight end in this offense getting anything. So this is now a real concern. And I made a massive mistake in the Flock League. I went through and I bid $21 on the FAB this week to pick up Gadsden. I needed a tight end. Hell, I'm starting Dallas Goedert or Hunter Henry every week. I put in a bid for $21. Zach put in a bid for $22. And Zach's the guy who ended up getting him. Like, he looks not only like a a trustworthy start, but he looks at the same time like a start with a ton of upside. Like, because it's a relatively small sample of two to three weeks that we have, and it's not like this round one NFL draft pick. I'm not going to go out there and put him over guys that we have a monstrous sample of. I'm not going to rank him over LaPorta. I'm not going to rank him over Kmet, Freiermuth, Hockenson. But I will put him in the same tier as Sam LaPorta. I have Dallas Goedert as my tight end one. Like I said, I put in that $21 FAB bid, and I was going to drop Hunter Henry for him. At this point, I would have dropped Dallas Goedert for the dude. So, we're gonna move him up to tight end eight. He's playing more and more every week. He looks phenomenal while out there. And we're not going to have him ahead of LaPorta. Not going to have him ahead of Kmet. Not going to have him ahead of Freiermuth, Hockenson. One more week like this, and I'm going to continue to move him up and up and up our rankings to where eventually maybe he is in that same tier with Freiermuth, Hockenson, and Kmet. But I think that's all we have for this. Let me see. We talked about the tight ends, running backs, quarterbacks on every team. And of course, you know, I'm too stupid to ever try to embarrass myself by talking about a single defensive player. Soon as I would do that, y'all would understand that, oh, dear God, I have the brain of a goldfish, and you should never click on this live stream ever again. But I am sure your brain is much bigger than a goldfish's brain. And for that reason, I know that you are absolutely going to crush on Underdog Fantasy. I'm just kidding. You're not going to. But I know some of y'all think you will. Some of y'all think Jackson Dart projects out way better than 15 and a half fantasy points this week. So, by all means, feel free to take the higher than 15 and a half points on Jackson Dart. Link to Underdog Fantasy is in the description. It's in the comment section. It's in the live chat. Underdog Fantasy is currently the number one sports app on the app store for three reasons. One, they're available in almost every state. Two, they're an incredible app. And three, they have the best promos in the industry right now. Code Flock gets you $100 added to your account after you play your first five. And on top of that, you're going to get a free gimme pick. Jordan Love, higher, lower, half a total yard as well for this weekend's. And you'll get free questions that you can ask me in the live streams. We're streaming every single day until Christmas answering your questions. Links in the description, comment section, live chat. Much love. I hope that you didn't start Quinton Johnston this week, but if you did, I'll see you in Valhalla.