Do Jauan Best Ball Values? Yes!

Charch and Kent Weyrauch identify six best ball players who are terrific values at their average draft position, along with six players we're avoiding at ADP.  Buckle up for the fireworks over Bucky Irving. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to Fantasy Football Weekly, a production of iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Time now for Fantasy Football Weekly from iHeartRadio, your weekly
source for the nation's best fantasy football advice, speculation, and
whatever stupid stuff they decided to drop into the show.
Now here's your host, Paul Charchian.

Speaker 1 (00:23):
Welcome to Fantasy Football Weekly. I am Paul Charchian. Very
happy to have you here this week and not making
his debut second time ever. We've got co host kent
Y Rock.

Speaker 3 (00:36):
Hi. Kent, Hey, Paul, how's it going. Thanks for bringing
me back. I know it's been a while, but I
appreciate the reinvitation.

Speaker 1 (00:43):
We felt like the last time was good enough to
bring you back, but not for a year.

Speaker 3 (00:49):
Yeah that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (00:50):
Yeah, we need it.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
Well.

Speaker 1 (00:51):
Cooling off period, I think to let you know, let
you really reflect on the Fantasy Football Weekly culture, values, listenership,
and you know, just maybe give you some time to
really get yourself set up correctly with the right frame
of mind. It was, you know, the last time was good.
It's good, you know, but you know, not so good
that we felt like we needed to have you back
in eleven months.

Speaker 3 (01:11):
That's fine. I had a whole year. I could watch
football and kind of enjoy my fantasy leagues and go
through the whole draft process. So I've been busy.

Speaker 1 (01:18):
It's all right, good. I am coming to you listeners
once again, like last week, from my closet. And I
explained this last week. And we don't spend a lot
of time on our on our personal lives in the show,
and maybe we should do more in the off season especially,
I don't know. But as I said last week, I've
moved into this new house in Utah, but I don't
have furniture yet, and so all the rooms are empty

(01:40):
and echoey, with the one exception of my closet, because
there are there's carpeting, there's clothing, and so I am
sitting in my closet. Kent, you can see it because
you can. You've got video right here. There's there's a
non zero chance that my wife's under things are in
the background somewhere. I don't know. Hopefully that's not the case.

(02:03):
We'll find we'll find out, I guess. But yeah, So
that's if it sounds a little bit different, that's why
in the closet. But Kent, no such constraints for you.

Speaker 3 (02:14):
No, my office is just about as small as a closet,
but it's a little bigger. So hopefully that goes not
too bad in here either.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
I think it's gonna I think it's gonna go great,
and we're excited to have you here at the your
real life job as data scientist. And I think what
I loved about having you on last time, as we
in a serious vein, is you you love grinding up
data and a lot of times, you know, our opinions
mean something. I test means something. You and I are

(02:41):
gonna have an eye test different difference of opinion later
in the show. But I love when people can find
ways to validate their arguments with statistics data. And you're
probably gonna put me to shame, Kent. I am not
a data scientist. I'm just I'm just Paul.

Speaker 3 (02:57):
Well, you know, at the end of the day, Fantasy
Football is a case environments. So I think any predictions
that are going to be made on the show come
with a lot of variants, and you know, it's it's
a lot of fun to kind of grind the data
and pull in you know, trends and stuff like that.
But at the end of the day, there's a lot
of injuries trades, weird things that happen every year, so
it can fall apart very quickly. I just like doing it.

(03:20):
It's a lot of fun. But yeah, we'll go back
and forth on it, for sure.

Speaker 1 (03:23):
That is a deal. What the they are are primary.
Primarily today we're going to talk about best ball players
you and I've You've done I know many best ball drafts.
I've done several. Although now that I'm in Utah, this
is something I really hadn't hadn't thought given a lot
of thought about I can't play basketball in Utah. I

(03:44):
don't think Utah is a legal state. I don't think
I haven't. I have not tried because I've been so
busy with my move, But I think I don't know
that I can play from here. I don't think. I
don't think Utah is a state. Now. Fortunately, I'm very
near the board of both Arizona and and Nevada, so
I can drive like forty five minutes and go scratch
that itch.

Speaker 3 (04:03):
Go right across the border, pull your phone out, do
a couple.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
Of exactly That's exactly. When I was living in Minneapolis,
I had to drive all the way to the border
of Iowa. So you know, that was almost two hours
to get there. So this is is in that regard
that's better from a sports betting standpoint. But I could
play best ball in Minnesota. It's it's absurd that every
state is different, right, So some states you can do
best ball and betting. Some states you can do betting

(04:27):
not best ball, some you can do best ball not betting,
and some you can do neither.

Speaker 3 (04:32):
And they can't seem to make up their minds about
what way it should be.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
Well, I think I know, but we can. You know,
I think our listeners probably know where I stand on this.
We've identified are for each of us are three most
undervalued and overvalued players for best ball in particular. So
we're putting on a lens of a best ball And
tell me kent for you. When you're talking best ball

(04:58):
as opposed to redraft, Dynasty, higher quillotine, or any other
format that you like, what are the things that that
make it, that make that go into your best ball
decision making that's different from the other formats.

Speaker 3 (05:12):
Yeah. So one thing that I like to think about
a lot is you know, if am I going to
have a tough time deciding to start this player on
a weekly basis. In a redraft league, I might avoid them,
but in a basketball league, you don't really have to
think about that. Yeah, you know, you're just aiming for
you know, overall points, but also spike weeks where they're
going out and scoring three touchdowns or something like that.
So high scoring offense is definitely come into play quite

(05:34):
a bit if you're looking for guys that are going
to contribute in the scoring column. So that's probably the
biggest difference, is you just want those high upside guys,
that kind of asymmetrical upside, because the lowest thing can
go well, I shouldn't say the lowest. I've seen negative
scores technically, but yes, for the most part, the lowest
score is zero. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
And you know, for me, this is almost like taking
everything I look for in a guillotine league player and
just reversing it. I'll just do the opposite of all
of those guys. You know, we are looking for higher
variance players. We are looking We don't ding players for
being as in for being inconsistent as much. We want
players where if things break right, they have a chance

(06:15):
to be league winners. Who want more lottery ticket guys.
I think in some cases backup runners have more value.
We'll talk about a lot of those, a lot of
those different best ball opportunities as we talk through our
undervalued and overvalued players. Ken, let's start here. I'm gonna
start with overvalued players, and I would like you to
go first and talk about somebody that you're not taking

(06:38):
at ADP.

Speaker 3 (06:39):
Yeah. So this is gonna be an interesting one, and
I know that we may come come to come to
blows up this one, but Bucky Irving is gonna be
my first selection for overvalued. I want to make one
thing very clear right up front. I love Bucky Irving
as a player. He's a great player. He had a
great rookie season. He's on a great offense. This all
sounds rate, but he's currently going at the twenty second

(07:03):
overall pick on underdog drafts and that's RB nine. So
he's going to be your running back one almost certainly,
unless you do some kind of running back running back
double up up top. But he's got a lot of
equity going into that draft selection. So you know, last
year he was drafted a round fourteen fifteen. He was
one of those lottery tickets we were talking about. Yeah,

(07:23):
and the scoring that you got out of him was
immensely valuable because you were able to spend such a
late pick on him. But this year, if you're you know,
second maybe third round, if you're absolutely lucky, is the
only way you can actually get him on your roster.
So the biggest thing for me is that this Tampa
Bay Buccaneers offense is bringing back a lot of guys
and then also brought in an additional receiver, so they

(07:46):
have a good stable of running backs, you know, regardless
of there's been you know, qualms about Rashad White as
a lead back, and that's understandable. But last year you
did see them begin to go in more of a
three headed drag in kind of deployment system where they
were using all of them interchangeably. Even though Bucking Irving
was the lead and getting a lot of work, they

(08:07):
were still rotating in Rashod White, still rotating in Sean Tucker,
who had a couple of big spots back last year.
And you know, frankly, all these guys did very well.
By the advanced metrics that I looked at. There's a
step that I used called rushing yards over expectation, which
basically takes into account you know where they are on
the field, what the scheme is like, and a variety

(08:29):
of different attributes for that individual down and says they
could run for three and a half yards, but they
ran for five instead, so that's one and a half
more yards. Yeah, And so you know, all three of
these guys were positive last year, and if we're looking
at just between the tackles, Bucky Irving was technically the
lowest of the three. Sean Tucker was at one point four,

(08:50):
Shot White one point one, and Bucky Irving ato point
eight over expectation. So again, they all were good, and
Bucky Irving was just the least.

Speaker 1 (08:58):
Good, But that's also just between the tackles.

Speaker 3 (09:01):
Correct, sure, totally and I totally understand that he's going
to be the lead back in his backfield. The question
is how much is he going to be on the
field if they are going to rotate through Rashad White's
technically a better pass blocking running back. You know, on
seventy nine pass blocking snaps, White is just seven pressures

(09:22):
in one sack last year and Bucky Irving on only
twenty eight pass blocking snaps allowed four pressures and three sacks.
And you know that could go quarterbacks are largely responsible
for when they're they're getting sacked on a pressure or not.
But it's still a somewhat telling that that was able
to occur on a much lower amount of snaps. So

(09:43):
they're they're probably going to trust them a little bit
less than Rashad White. And then you know, like I said,
they drafted I Mecha Agbuka and he's going to be great.
He's going to you know, hopefully contribute very early on
in his offense. He's super awesome receivers.

Speaker 1 (09:56):
Yeah, I think I think he will be a contributor,
But I don't I don't necessarily see that is a
bad thing. I like, I feel like this is a
rising boats thing. If you if you just put more
and more weapons on an offense, I just feel like
that's more trips over the fifty yard line, more trips
into the red zone, more trips at the stripe where
Bucky Irving is gonna get paid.

Speaker 3 (10:14):
Yeah, and I guess you're gonna hope that he's gonna
have a ten plus touchdown season. That would be one
way that he could pay off.

Speaker 1 (10:22):
Kenny had an eight touchdown season last year. Didn't even
start games until halfway through the season.

Speaker 3 (10:27):
Totally true. But again, it's just that that cost associated
with it that I think is the biggest hang up
for me. And you know, I'm not saying I won't
draft him if he does fall to the third round
and I have a good, you know, maybe running back
wide receiver setup. He's an awesome dude to take us
your second running back, I'm totally in on that. But
if he's your first running back, I am going to
steer clear and maybe go for more of a like

(10:48):
zero or beat type build or something like that. So yeah,
I don't know, it's just it's just expensive. I think
that's the biggest reason. Love the player, hate the cost.

Speaker 1 (10:57):
Yeah, you and I. You and I are different on
this and and we'll see if we have other differences.
I love Bucky Irving part of its eye test to do.
I think he's I think he is the hardest running
full time back in the NFL right now. The metrics
are eye popping. You know, you gave some of the
down metrics, I'll give some of the up metrics on
Bucky Irving. He finished third in avoided tackle rate among

(11:22):
players at least one hundred and twenty carries, a twenty
seven percent avoided tackle rate. He finished at five and
a half yards per carry, and his third down conversion
rate was eighty percent, which was highest than the highest
in the league among NFL starting backs. There's I just

(11:42):
I think this guy is. I think Bucky Irving is
a special player. I'm happy to get him at his
at his ADP, which is where is his ADP again?
Right here?

Speaker 3 (11:51):
I had him at twenty two.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
Over twenty two, yep, twenty two running back nine. Honestly,
I think it's light he's going to be. I'm gonna
put on my first rankings the year next week, I expect,
and I think he's gonna be. He's gonna off the
board in Bestball at running back nine. On underdog. I
think I'm gonna have him closer to running back five.
So this is just one they use. I think you
and I yep, I think you and I are just

(12:13):
gonna gonna agree to disagree on that one. My overvalued player,
my first overvalue player, a guy was nervous about for
a lot of Fantasy Football Weekly Is last year. This
one comes a big surprise to people. Joe Mixon, his
ADP is fifty, He's running back fifteen, and here's my quibbles,
Kent and feel free to jump in anytime. Houston's rebuild

(12:34):
offensive line tons of question marks. They were awful last year.
They ranked thirtieth in run block win rate, they were
twenty seventh in Pro Football Focuses run blocking ranking, and
all they did to improve their starting rotation they turned
away Laramie Tunsel. And I don't blame him for that either.
He was as overpaid as a player as there was

(12:56):
in the NFL. But they backfilled him with Cam Robinson,
who you'll remember the Jaguars traded for a ham Sandwich
to the Vikings. The Vikings started him only because they
had to, and then in this offseason the Vikings let
him walk, and then they signed Cam Rombinson at left tackle.
This will be his third team in two years. And
then the other part that worries me about Mixing was

(13:18):
how you know, he started off the season really well,
got heard, came back still look pretty good, and then
he just he just ran out of gas last year.
He's had two thousand, three hundred career touches spanning eight seasons.
He's going to turn twenty nine years old in a
couple of months, and I'm just worried that the end

(13:39):
is here for Joe Mixon, and I don't know that
it is Kent because the offensive line was so bad.
I think a lot of back sort of struggled last
year behind this Houston offensive line. But I'd kind of
rather get out a year early than a year too late.
Last six games of last year for Joe Mixon Kent.
He drooped to twenty ninth in rushing yards over the
last six games of last year, thirty first in yards

(14:03):
per carry at just three point four, which is miserable,
and he dropped a twenty fifth and avoided tackle rate,
which you can't blame on the offensive line. So I'm
just worried. I think I'd rather get out a year
early on Joe Mixon, and I think this is the
year to get out. What do you think?

Speaker 3 (14:20):
Yeah, I'm not going to fight you too much on
this one. He's kind of at the age cliff. He's
at the touch cliff, like you were talking about. He
saw a big reduction in kind of his value last year.
The offense overall had a lot of struggles. Even CJ.
Stroud himself is not free to blame in this offense.
So yeah, that's tough. The only saving grace is that
he really has no competition. I don't think that anyone

(14:43):
is going to step up and steal a ton of work.

Speaker 1 (14:45):
That is correct.

Speaker 3 (14:46):
That is, if you truly want the volume, you can
take it. But again, you talk about that upside, I
don't think he has much.

Speaker 1 (14:55):
All right, let's go to your next over valued best
ball player. Who are you going with for your second?
Your second guy?

Speaker 3 (15:02):
Yeah, I'm gonna go with Tyreek Hill. This one just
feels too easy right now. Honestly, he's going twenty fourth
overall wide receiver thirteen. You know, he was drafted as
a top five wide receiver for years, and he's not
much lower than that, despite having a truly horrific season
last year, at least for his case. And he's thirty

(15:23):
one years old, frankly, I mean, he's getting up there
in age. Even though he is, you know, a slighter fellow,
he's able to probably handle that a little bit better
than some of the slighter receivers.

Speaker 1 (15:32):
Slighter fellow, slighter fellow.

Speaker 3 (15:35):
You know, he's a little whispy guy out there. He
runs fast and that's part of his deal. But you know,
last year he was wide receiver thirty three in PPR
points per game, and you are not happy if you
get that out of him this year. And as far
as I remember, he didn't even have any truly explosive
weeks either. It was like, you hope he got a

(15:56):
touchdown just so you could have a normal fantasy week
out of Tyreek Kill. So you know, this is another team,
the Miami Dolphins, that has some offensive line issues. That's
an interesting rough shape. Yes, yeah, Toronto Arstaid is retired.
They signed James Daniels, which is an okay signing, and
they drafted Jonah seven Aya. I think I'm saying that right.
I hope I am in round two. But their offensive

(16:19):
tackles are two guys named Patrick Paul and Austin Jackson.
And I'll give you a bonus points if you can
tell me how good they are. But they're just league
average at best, and they're gonna have a lot of
issues getting this offense moving, kind of similar to the
Houston issues over there. But yeah, in twenty twenty four,
career lows in yards per route run, yards per target,

(16:40):
yack after the reception PFF for receiving grade, and he
tied his rookie season touchdown total as well, but he
had forty more targets in twenty twenty four, So that's
a low for me. It was tough, and if you
had him, you were not in good shape. And frankly,
at wide receiver thirteen, I'm not interested. I'm I'm tapping

(17:00):
out probably on the Miami Dolphins. Dolphins offense in totality
at their current prices. We may talk about that a
little bit more in a bit, but uh, yeah, it's
it's tough.

Speaker 1 (17:12):
I had Tyreek Hill on my list until I saw
he was on your list, so I was also going
to do Tyreek Hill, and I think there's, uh, there
was there's a lot of good reason for that. For
that you've you've outlined here. Not touching him at twenty
fourth overall wide receiver thirteen, I don't even know. I
I you know, the whole two situation as well, is uh,

(17:34):
there's just to me, there's just, uh, there's just too
much risk here for Tyreek Hill at that price point.
My next over valued player is Marvin Harrison Junior, going
off the board at pick number twenty eight, Wide receiver sixteen.
You know, at that ADP kent you he people are
assuming he's going to get way way better in year

(17:57):
number two, and I'm not sure that's a safe assumption.
I hope he does. I hope I'm wrong. He will
be better next year. I think there's you know, almost
certainly be better, but so much better that he should
be going off the board at the twenty eighth pick.
He wasn't even close to the twenty eighth receiver last year.
And you know, what we saw last year, to me

(18:19):
was really troubling. And he was Pro Football focuses wide
receiver thirty five. He ranked thirty fourth in yards. He
had one more yard than John Neusmith. That's it, thirty
seventh in yards after reception. He had two point four
yards after reception among wide receivers that was thirty seventh.
That kent two point four yards after reception. You were

(18:40):
getting you're basically getting tackled and falling forward at that
point to get your two point four yards at the
point of the catch. He finished worse than wide receiver
forty seven different times last year Marvin Harrison. So you know,
he needs to get so much better from the verse
we saw last year to live up to ADP twenty

(19:03):
eight that I don't think Marvin Harrison can get there,
And I'd have felt better if they'd added a second
wide receiver opposite side of the field that was going
to take some of the defensive pressure off Marvin Harrison.
That is Zay Jones. That doesn't even count. So I
am out on Marvin Harrison at ADP twenty eight. What
do you think?

Speaker 3 (19:22):
Yeah? I think the only thing I'll say here is
that you know, he had eight hundred and eighty five
yards and eight touchdowns. That's for a rookie season. Pretty good.
And you know, we for the longest time had this
like third year breakout kind of strategy for wide receivers.
We waited a few years, we let them develop. Marveson
Harrison Junior certainly was seen as a top flight prospect.

(19:44):
You know, he's got the name, the family value there,
and honestly, he had a really great prospect profile. I
think it was just kind of a tough fit in
Arizona offense. You know, he's a lot better in kind
of the contested catch situations. Like you said, he would
catch it and fall forward as pretty much all he
was doing. But they need to get him moving on

(20:05):
a little bit different routes go a little bit more laterally,
try and make some space for him in the scheme,
and I think things could go a little better. I
agree with you, I'm probably not going to be drafting him.
I do remain skeptical but hopeful about his year two
and beyond progress. Though.

Speaker 1 (20:21):
I hope I'm wrong about Marvin Harrison Kent. I hope
he has a great season. Let's go to your third
and final over valued best ball player.

Speaker 3 (20:29):
Yeah, this is another price point problem, and it's Colston Lovelin,
the new rookie on the Chicago Bears, drafted even before
Tyler Warren, which I think was a shock to many people.
Maybe not everyone, but those two guys were certainly seeing
as the top two tight ends in his draft class.
He's being drafted at one ten, so we're looking at

(20:50):
the ninth round roughly and tight end nine. So people
think he's ready to step in and be a tight
end one the top twelve tight ends for this season.
I'm not so gung ho about that. You know, he's
probably gonna be a good player, but if you're expecting
anything like what Brock Bauers did last year, you're going
to be gravely gravely disappointed. Uh and he had roughly

(21:12):
the same ADP last year as Loveland does. This year
brought Bowers. So I think a lot of people are
kind of riding on those coattails a little bit and
thinking that Loveland could do something similar. You know, Cole
Comett is still in this offense. They're gonna use a
lot of twelve personnel. Ben Johnson, whose new in town,
loves Dude's twelve personnel. They were third most in the

(21:32):
league last year for the Lions, that is thirty two
point two percent. So Cole Comette's gonna be on the
field too. They're gonna, you know, utilize probably both of
them in the one tight end sets as well. So
if you're getting more than seventy percent snaps out of Loveland,
I'd be shocked. I think he's gonna be more of
those middle percentages. And you know, going back to twenty ten,

(21:56):
only six instances of tight ends in their rookie season
had more than ten PPR points per game in their
rookie year. So yes, I don't I don't particularly believe
that Loveland is going to be the guy to do
like what Brock Bauers did or anything remotely similar. We
need we still need to see it from Caleb Williams
on his Bears offense before Yeah, I can trust you know,

(22:17):
the third, fourth, fifth option on this offense. Who knows
right now? They still have a lot of good pass
catchers there, so it's gonna be very interesting. But yeah,
Titan nine, I will not be drafting Colston Loveland this
year unless he dips considerably.

Speaker 1 (22:31):
The I'm with you one hundred percent on everything you
just said. Let me give you another another example. We
all assumed Dalton Kincaid would just mow down Dawson Knox,
and for two years that hasn't happened. You know, we
saw flashes where he looked better than Dawson Knox, but honestly,
you know, it's almost a timeshare between those two for
two straight years. And Kincaid had first round equity as well.

(22:54):
And you know the other thing about Bowers is Bowers
on a team where though there was nobody else to
even get the ball to, Chicago's got so many more options.
Everybody thinks Romadoonza it's sitting on a big season that
he's gonna break out. They added Luther Burden, They've got
DJ Moore. You know, they've got so many other weapons
they don't have to funnel their offense to their rookie

(23:14):
tight end the same way the Raiders did. So I
think that's a I think that's a great call in
Colston Lovelin. All right, my final guy that I'm using
is my over valued best ball player is T Higgins,
And a little bit like you said with Bucky Irving,
I wanna be really careful here. T Higgins a good player.
I like him, and you know, but I don't know

(23:37):
that he's going off the board at pick twenty three. Overall,
I just don't know that any guy who's not who's
the number two receiver on his own team Kent should
be going off the board at his position at pick
number twenty three. And so this is entirely a conversation
about ADP. Like you said with Bucky Irving, he just

(24:00):
stands in that long, deep shadow cast by Jamar Chase,
who had one hundred and seventy five targets last year,
one hundred and forty five of the year before. You know,
there are just some games where there just aren't enough
balls to go around. For T Higgins, he was under
sixty yards and one third of his games, and he
topped eighty eight yards just two times. He's very, very

(24:21):
touchdown dependent. Now, now granted, in best ball touchdown dependent
is not the end of the world. I mean, you
can you know that is okay to have those spike
touchdown weeks. That is all right, but it picked twenty three.
I'd like to have just more consistency than what I
think I'm gonna get out of T Higgins there at
that price point. So that to me is that's my

(24:43):
case against against T Higgins and as my third over
valued best ball player. Kent your thoughts.

Speaker 3 (24:50):
Well, And now that he's got his contract, he's gonna
stop trying. He earned his money and he can just
give up and sit on the bed. No, I'm just kidding.
Uh yeah, I don't hate this one. I will probably
consider it the only The only thing that makes him
less draftable for me, even though he is a good player,
is that it's really tough to get a Bengals stack
with all these three guys being very expensive in price.

(25:10):
So it's definitely one of the tough ones to do.
And like you said, if he's the second option on
the team, you gotta hope you well, pretty much. If
you're not in the top you know two slots, you
might get Chase, but most likely you are not going
to have Chase. So that means you just got Higgins
and Burrow. I'm not in on that, so uh yeah,
that that's a fine call out. But he's a good player,

(25:32):
He's just he's just a little pricey, and so are
his other very rich compadres.

Speaker 1 (25:36):
All right, when we come back, we're gonna give you
six players we love at their price point. So we've
got kind of negative here ken to start this show.
We're going to turn things around and look for some
positivity and identify three each of our favorite best ball
value players when we come back. Welcome back Fantasy Football Weekly,

(26:03):
Paul Jarchian, Kent, why wreck with you as well? Kent.
We've started with the negative side, players that were nervous
about at their price point. Now let's go to players
that we're excited to draft and in many cases will reach,
will reach for and I will once again, I'll let
you go first. Tell me who, tell me who you're
targeting in best Ball.

Speaker 3 (26:25):
Yeah, so this is an interesting one, and honestly, I
was a little bit on offense about it. But I
decided to go with my gut and throw it on
the list. Anyway, Okay, I'm gonna go with Michael Pennix Junior.
And this might come as a surprise to some people.
You know, he's pretty cheap right now. He's one hundred
and forty fifth overall QB twenty one. Yeah, very very yeah, exactly.
So it's very easy to be undervalued when you're when

(26:46):
you're that cheap. But one thing that's very interesting is
that the Atlanta Falcons have the fourth easiest strength of
schedule this year based on the win totals at Vegas
as calculated by Sharp Football. So if we have an
opportunity for Penix to come into this offense, get motivated,
have some wins under his belt, and really develop as

(27:08):
a passer, this is an opportunity for him this year.
Kirk Cousins is technically on the roster. I think it's
very likely that he's traded at some point. I think
he is overall resigned from the idea of playing for
the Atlanta Falcons anymore. I think I could be wrong
on that, but that does feel like the undertones right now.
You know, Kirk has expressed that he wants to start

(27:30):
in this league still, and I think that, you know,
maybe the Steelers, with Aaron Rodgers drag and his feet,
maybe they just say, you know what, forget you're We'll
go get Cousins. He'll be able to play for us.
We still have a decent roster less one wide receiver
in George Pickens who's now gone. But regardless, back to
the Falcons Pennix. You know, in his third start last year,

(27:51):
which was the last three weeks of twenty twenty four,
he had three hundred and twelve passing yards, two passing
touchdowns and a rushing touchdown. That was twenty six fantasy
points roughly to be And what league format you're in
and all that, but that is a higher single game
total than Drake May, Trevor Lawrence, C J. Stroud, which
we talked about his struggles last year. Those three guys
are all going ahead of him right now. And he

(28:11):
played just three games. Now, granted it was Week eighteen,
and granted it was against the Carolina Fans.

Speaker 1 (28:16):
That's a pretty big asterisk right there.

Speaker 3 (28:19):
But that is a big aster risk and I will
accept it. But you know, he's got some exciting value
to him and they're bringing back essentially the identical offense
from last year, Drake London, Darnell Mooney, Kyle Pitts. You know,
we're all gonna convince ourselves once again that Kyle Pitts
has an opportunity. But it's a good pass catching group
and you know, be John Robinson at Tyler Lgier at

(28:41):
the running back position. It's a great offense. So okay, okay,
pretty good?

Speaker 1 (28:48):
Yeah, all right, pretty good.

Speaker 3 (28:49):
I'll go now I want an adjective on there. Pretty good.
But I think this is a good opportunity for them
to have the entire offseason to work together. They can
review the film from last year, talk about what didn't work.
He can step in as the starter. Kirk is still
technically there for now to you know, mentor him as
much as he might feel compelled to. But you know,

(29:10):
I think this is a good year for Michael Pennock junior.
And like I said, it's the cheap value where I'm
going to swing for one of those guys that could
have like a top ten upside type of season if
he steps into his prospect profile. And at Washington he
was averaging three hundred and forty one passing yards a game.
So this guy can sling it, and I'm hoping that
he can step into the Falcons offense and sling it too.

(29:32):
And the best part, you know, talking about making those
stacks and cheaper ADP. This is not a Bengal situation.
Drake is sixteenth overall, Darnold Mooney is ninetieth, Kyle Pitts
one forty six, and Ray Ray McLeod who you know,
kind of a throwaway last pick type guy. But if
you have a stack going fee, feel free to add
him to the list. And you've got a nice little
stack here that could make you some money if it

(29:53):
does step up into something slightly better than pretty good.
So yeah, we're hoping for that. I just I think
it's an interesting case where a lot could go right
and then things turn out really well for him.

Speaker 1 (30:05):
That's Michael Penix, I the guy, the out of the
guy out of that Falcons offense, a guy I'm targeting.
I've been targeting Darnell Mooney because he's the you know
this big play speed and you know he did. He
does give you the bigger variance than obviously Drake London does.
But I like I do, I like them. I like
the Darnell Mooney side of it at ADP ninety more

(30:27):
than I like paying the Drake London at sixteen, for sure. Yeah,
all right, my first undervalued player is my favorite sleeper
from last year, and so your listeners are gonna be like,
oh charge, Here he goes again, reminding us that he
nailed his favorite sleeper last year. Yeah, that is kind
of happening here too. But he's still undervalued. And it's

(30:50):
Khalil Shakir, the Buffalo wide receiver currently going off the
board at pick eighty one, wide receiver forty five. What
that doesn't even make sen That is a calculate to
me at all. So last year for Khalil shakir breakout season,
he jumped from forty targets the year before to one
hundred targets. He went from thirty nine receptions to seventy

(31:13):
six receptions. And Shakir's really good among receivers with more
than fifty catches. He finished number one in yards after
catch last year eight yards after catch, and that was
no fluke. Last year, when I was trying to make
my case for Khalil Shakir to be the last pick
of your draft, he was third in yards after catch

(31:35):
behind Deebo Samuel and Tyreek Hill. I mean, that's awfully
good company. And this year he's number one. Coming out
of last season, they get the Bills liked him so
much they gave him a four year new contract, so
obviously they believe in him. And he's the number one
target for the first quarterback being taken in Best Ball

(31:55):
drafts Josh Allen. He had just two drops last year out.
Shakir is not bulletproof. I mean, you know, there is
a reason he's going at wide receiver forty five, and
that's mostly because it's a lot of short stuff. You know,
typically in Best Ball you want some explosiveness to your game.
His a dot was just five and a half yards.
It's one of the shortest in the league. He is

(32:17):
not an end zone target guy, just a ten percent
end zone target rate. But you know, he had the big,
big move last year Kent where he got so much
better than Khalil Shakir was the year before. You know,
if he gets just incrementally better this year, I think
we're gonna see the touchdown the touchdown numbers go up,

(32:39):
and the explosive plays go up, and I think Khalil
Shakir is simply better than the forty fifth best fantasy
wide receiver.

Speaker 3 (32:47):
Yeah, I mean, I'm not gonna fight you too much
here because he is so cheap. My only commentary would
be that, you know, the Buffalo Bills. I don't know
if you saw the deal with Brandon Bean talking about
drafting receivers or not, and how that's an ordeal amongst
the fans, but you know they did go get Elijah Moore,
that they have Joshua Palmer there now they might have
some kind of a platoon system. Yeah, I know, I'm

(33:09):
not They're not.

Speaker 1 (33:10):
Touching a guy. They just those guys are not touching
a guy. They just gave fifty million dollars too.

Speaker 3 (33:14):
I trust me. I totally agree he's going to be
the top guy on this offense. But they were the
number one scoring offense last year and they did something
similar with their wide receiver group last year, so you
know that that'd be my only argument. But again, he's cheap.
I'm not going to push too much here.

Speaker 1 (33:28):
Let's go to your number two undervalued best ball player.

Speaker 3 (33:32):
Yeah, I'm gonna go with Alvin Kamara, And honestly, it's
tough because he's getting up there in age two. I
talked about Tyreek Hill earlier, and we talked about Joe
Mixon getting up there in age I think again, another
slightly fellow, if you'll allow me to use the phrase
once again.

Speaker 1 (33:47):
How many slight fellows are there in the league?

Speaker 3 (33:49):
Now, Well, there's just at least two, at least two.
But you know he he's been drafted as the running
back twenty one and last year he was running back
six in points per game and he'll had eight total touchdowns.
Now that's been a kind of a trend for a
few years. He hasn't had those big touchdown seasons like
he did. Yeah, don't if you remember Becking, what was
that twenty twenty dropped? Was it six against the Vikings?

Speaker 1 (34:10):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (34:11):
Five or six? Yeah, that was hard to get out.

Speaker 1 (34:13):
I got I got knocked. I lost a fantasy championship
and that was a Saturday. I'm in the fantasy I'm
in a Guillotine League fantasy championship, might I add? You know,
so you make it all the way through seventeen weeks
of cuts, you're in the championship game and it's over
on Saturday when your opponent starts. Alvin Kamara it was
still best.

Speaker 3 (34:33):
You were just going to the week like I've lost,
even though I have my entire roster left the play
for the most part. But you know, regardless of that,
twenty twenty four was his highest scrimmage yardage total since
twenty twenty So he had fourteen hundred and ninety three
scrimmage yards. That was the eleventh most in the league
last year behind Devon Ah Chang, who you know, he's
being drafted as running back seven right now, and that's

(34:55):
a pretty stark difference in cost. Now, granted he had
a few more touchdowns and all that, but you know,
I think that Alvin Kamara has a good opportunity to
repeat his usage. The Saint sign Clyde Edwards a Laire
drafted a sixth rounder in Devin Neil.

Speaker 1 (35:11):
Well, I like, you know, we've and Thorn and I
talked about this just last week. I believe we both
think Devin Neil is a really intriguing player to uh
to target near the end and it might be the
very last pick of your draft. Uh. You know, if
if you think Alvin Kamara and you're right, last year
he looked good. I mean, Kamara still looked a lot

(35:32):
like the player we've seen. But if you just feel
like this is this might be the beginning of the
end for Alvin Kamara. Devin Neil brings the table pass
catching chops, interior running chops, super good footwork. He's he's
a really intriguing player and and there's something to be
said about at a minimum, hancuffing those guys. So just
a quick aside on Devin Neil before we should just

(35:54):
throw him away here. I think there's, uh, there is
something to like about that kid.

Speaker 3 (35:58):
Yeah, absolutely, only come you know. The only thing I'll
say is he was a sixth rounder, so you know,
at least maybe give him some time to acclimate to
the NFL that that the NFL told us what they
think about him. He could outperform that for sure. But
and like you said, you can add him in the
back of your draft if you want to go with
a handcuff situation. Yeah, totally agree. But you know, as
far as his main competition, I think Andre Miller is

(36:20):
still the guy that you're the most worried about, but
I'm not. At the end of last season, he was
truly horrendous. Head In a final two games of the year,
he had eleven rushes for eighteen yards on the ground.
He had three receptions for thirty two yards. But it
was really bad. And honestly, I don't know if you
know this. Last year Kamara rushed sixteen point three times
per game, which was the second highest in his career.

Speaker 1 (36:42):
So you put you but Kent. We could use that
both ways, right, You could be like, look, we're just
we're adding more hits onto an already what is he
in his seventh year something like that at least, Yeah, yeah,
you know, we're adding yet more hits and more workload
onto that frame. And you know that's you know that
might that might have end up that workload from last
year might end up working against Alvin Kamara.

Speaker 3 (37:03):
Well, And that's kind of what I was going to
lead into here, is that he historically has thrived on
limited yet valuable touches. He's you know, obviously a really
great receiver, probably one of the best receiving running backs
in the game right now or the last decade or so.
He's done a very good job catching the ball and
making yardage out of that. So I think that he
still has an opportunity to land in a twelve to

(37:25):
thirteen rush four to seven reception range that he's always
kind of done, and that's a reduction from last year,
but it's enough to get those high value touches if
he can have any kind of upsing on touchdowns, which
you know, might be asking a lot if Derek Carr
can't play, and that's something we're yet to be determined here,
but I think maybe this is a little bit kind

(37:46):
of galaxy brained, but Tyler Shuck draft pick might be
a sign of confidence for Derek Carr being able to
play at the beginning of the season. They really don't
have a lot as far as a starting quarterback on
the roster. Spencer Ratler and Ja Hayner are non starters.
Do not have the confidence to put those guys out
there week one, And I don't think Schuck's the guy
you want playing week one either. You've probably sit him

(38:06):
down for a season and develop them up a little bit.
So if Derek Carr does start, this offense is again
not great, but still decent, good enough to score some touchdowns.
And if Alvin Kamara has little to no competition for
you know, this year, at least I'm all in running
back twenty one, that's pretty affordable and if he can
repeat last year and maybe throw on another touchdown or two,

(38:28):
that's that's making money right there.

Speaker 1 (38:30):
My second undervalued basketball player is Vikings running back Jordan Mason.
His ADP is one hundred and six running back, thirty
four off the board. They're thirty two NFL team, so
this is one of the top backups going and correctly so.
So there's not a lot of times where I can
talk about Kent like personal experience where you know, I

(38:53):
talked to a player. I worked the official Vikings draft
party and Aaron Jones is there and I asked him.
I asked Aaron Jones about his role in this offense,
and he said he's going to yield short yardage carries
to Jordan Mason. So you know, right from his mouth,
we know that Jordan Mason is going to get those carries,
and it makes sense. Aaron Jones from inside the five
yard line last year thirteen carries, negative two yards and

(39:17):
just three touchdowns on the thirteen carries. That's terrible. So
here comes Jordan Mason. We know he's a good interior runner.
He weighs twenty pounds more than Aaron Jones. He's his
career average is five point three yards per carry. Granted
I'm relatively light workloads because it's it's he's a young player.
Remember the Vikings traded to get a Jordan Mason, so

(39:39):
they gave up equity to get him, so obviously they
like him. He's not going to be somebody who's gonna
catch a lot of passes. But Jordan Mason is going
to bring every week one touchdown, two touchdown, maybe even
three touchdown offense unless JJ McCarthy's awful, and that.

Speaker 3 (39:56):
Is oh well, well, don't let thor hear you say.

Speaker 1 (39:58):
I know right exactly. I think JJ is gonna be good,
but maybe I just want him to be good. But
I think JJ is going to be good, and Jordan Mason,
you know he's got He's going to be the touchdown
guy in this offense. You could make the opposite side
of this is I feel like in best ball especially,
you can't touch Aaron Jones. He could be sitting on

(40:19):
a three four touchdown season and that would that would
really worry me, even at his depressed ADP. I think
you can't touch Aaron Jones, who, by the way, thirty
years old and has a history of getting dinged up.
Although he played all the games last year for the Vikings,
but that again, that might work against him at age thirty,
that he was given such a big workload. So we're

(40:39):
going to see a lot of Jordan Mason this year,
and I'm buying at ADP one h six.

Speaker 3 (40:43):
Yeah, earlier I mentioned, you know, rushing back excuse me,
running backs, rushing yards over expectation. Jordan Mason was third
per attempt last year. He's good.

Speaker 1 (40:52):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (40:52):
He's good at football, and you know, I'm glad we
got him in a deal that was relatively cheap from
a Vikings perspective, so that should be a good one
to punch in Aaron Jones and Jordan Mason. I was
a little surprised to see how high his ADP came up.
I was hoping it would be a little cheaper me too,
But I do understand why people are excited because he
has had the juice every time he touched the ball

(41:13):
last year. So it's a lot of fun, that's for sure.

Speaker 1 (41:16):
There's a chance that he's better than Aaron Jones and
that that this roles are gonna flip flop in Jordan
Mason at some point in the year, and maybe sooner
than later he turns into the Alpha Jones turns into
the change of pace guy and the passing down guy
because Mason can't catch there is it goes that way.
All right, your final undervalued best ball player is somebody

(41:37):
I wanted to use, but you had already picked him.
So let's go agree on Juwan Jennings.

Speaker 3 (41:43):
All right, Yeah, I'm glad to do it again talking
about someone who's he's wide receiver thirty seven right now,
ADP sixty six, So he's very affordable for a guy
who put up some really impressive numbers last year, and
now the Deebo Samuel's gone. Brandon Aiyuk, there's still some
you know, floaters in the air about him potentially being traded.

(42:03):
I think there's a lot of tenuous conversations going on
in the forty nine ers building around him. You know,
Ricky pearsall who showed flashes last year and the year
really strong, but he played more, you know, I would say,
an average of seventy percent of the snaps and was
mostly invisible for a lot of those games. So you know,
at the end of the year he turned it on
a bit that might translate to the entire next season.

(42:25):
But I have a feeling that's probably going to be
a trend that continues. He'll have games where he's there
in games where he's not. Juwan Jennings, on the other hand,
he was there every game. Yeah, he was performing outstanding
and on among the forty nine ers pass catching options,
Jennings was second in receiving yards per game, just Bryank Kittle,
first in red zone targets, second in receiving touchdowns behind Kittle,

(42:46):
second in yards per route run behind Kittle, second in
PFF receiving grade behind Kittle. Yeah, and then of course
first in targets of twenty plus yards, which is you
know something that I don't know if you recall this
is a while ago now. When he was coming out
he was a seventh rounder. He had a really slow
forty times. It was like a four to seven four
or something like that, and he had some off the

(43:06):
field stuff to really tank his stock. But he has
had a lot of opportunity to work on his route tree.
He's got pretty good hands. He's putting it all together.
In the last year was his fourth year, entering his
fifth year. Now, he's really brought himself up to a
level that's been quite impressive as an NFL receiver. And
he was a transition out of quarterback in high school

(43:28):
into receiver in college. So he's twenty seven and a
half years old, roughly. It took him a little while,
but I think he's figured it out. And fun fact,
this is a great fun fact. I absolutely had to
bring this up. Juan Jennings is the second player in
Super Bowl history who threw and caught a touchdown, joining
who else but Nick Foles, Yes, Chars.

Speaker 1 (43:48):
Philly's Company special of course.

Speaker 3 (43:50):
Yeah, yep, you know he's and he's six three, two twelve.
He's got really kind of rare size these days, as
you know, the NFL gets smaller and quicker, both on
the wide receivers and the cornerbacks. It's nice to have
a guy who, you know, despite his concerns for his speed,
is able to create separation, catch the ball with confidence,

(44:11):
turn get up field. He could stand to improve his
yack ability a little bit. That's probably his most glaring
fix that needs to happen. But he's likely going to
be the top receiver on the forty nine ers offense
this year. I think that's I think too.

Speaker 1 (44:26):
I think so too. I just love him. You know,
some guys are just players. And Juwan Jennings he loves
to block, he loves to hit guys. He loves physical play.
He's big, he's a bully. I just I love the
way he plays. I think Kyle Shanahan does too. And
I agree that he's going to lead the forty nine ers.
And given his ADP of wide receiver thirty seven, I'm in.

(44:51):
I'm in. That's a that is a you know, it's
I don't think it's gonna be a great San Francisco offense,
and it'll be a good San Francisco offense and I
can get the best receiver at wide receiver thirty seven,
pick sixty six overall, I'll take it for Juwan Jennings.
All right. Our last player to be covered in this show,
My final undervalued best ball player is David Montgomery. ADP

(45:13):
is picked seventy two, running back twenty four. Hey, Ken,
do you like touchdowns?

Speaker 3 (45:22):
I've enjoyed them from time to time.

Speaker 1 (45:23):
Yes, no touchdown enjoyer. Yes. If I told you right now,
David Montgomery is going to lead the NFL in rushing
touchdowns in twenty twenty five. Is that a plausible statement.

Speaker 3 (45:41):
Plausible Yes, for sure, Yes, I.

Speaker 1 (45:43):
Mean that's not it is absolutely in the realm of possibility.
And he's running back twenty four in Best Ball. You know,
we know the Lions love to run the ball near
the stripe, and that's not going away with Ben Johnson.
Dan Campbell is going to do. That's a Dan camp
that if Dan Gambele is he is going to punish
you at the stripe. The Lions over the last two

(46:05):
seasons have ranked number one in rushing attempts from inside
the five yard line. And they've done that without having
a quarterback doing the tush push to inflate those stats,
having Josh Allen do inflace those stats. Jared Goff's not
running the ball from the three yard line, that's all
they're running backs. And more Montgomery than Jamiir Gibbs and

(46:26):
the other side that I like about Montgomery, not just
the touchdown upside, which in Best Ball we do. We
want touchdown upside. We want those explosive games where David
Montgomery gets you two or three in a game, which
which he's done many times. But if anything God forbid
were to happen to Jamier Gibbs. You've got a top
five running back for your best ball team, so there's

(46:49):
a ton to like at David Montgomery at eightp. Seventy two,
I believe. Are you with me on this.

Speaker 3 (46:53):
Ken, Yeah, I think the biggest challenge to David Montgomery
scoring a touchdown inside the three is Jumior Gibbs scoring
it from inside the ten. I think that's the biggest
challenge because they're going to score, it's just a matter
of who it's going to be. And honestly, I'm on
Rossain Brown's a great red zone threat as well.

Speaker 1 (47:10):
Right, Yeah, They've got Yeah, they've got so many they
have so many players that there's gonna be variants with Montgomery,
but it's best Ball. We're embracing the variants here, Kent.

Speaker 3 (47:19):
That's right, Yes, absolutely, yeah, I'm in on that one.
Like you said, so, I don't there's no visual component
to this particular podcast right now. But I raise my
eyebrows when you said what his price tag was. I
had not even looked at that one specifically yet, so
that that is honestly a very very affordable price point.
I would love to buy in on the potential for
fifteen touchdowns. Yes, if you want to, if you want

(47:41):
to go towards that route.

Speaker 1 (47:42):
Yeah, if Montgomery plays a full season of seventeen games,
I think he is sitting at that twelve thirteen, fourteen
to fifteen sixteen touchdown range because it's just it's such
a good offense and we know they're going to run
the ball. So yeah, David Montgomery, our final guy. Thank
you listening. Everybody had great job. I'd like to have

(48:03):
you this time. I have you back in next week.

Speaker 3 (48:07):
I believe. Yeah, or.

Speaker 1 (48:10):
All right, spoiler alert right now. Every everybody thought it
was gonna be ten months and then you'd come back
and they'd all be pleasantly surprised next week or well,
cats out of the bank. We'll have you back next week.
And uh, I'm trying to remember what what's our? What
is our? What are we talking about? Next week?

Speaker 3 (48:24):
We are breaking down the divisions.

Speaker 1 (48:26):
Oh yeah, we're going to start our divisional breakdowns. Right,
so we're we've got uh, we've got I believe six
shows or is it three shows? I think trying to
remember we're doing two four show We're.

Speaker 3 (48:37):
Going, uh direction, Yeah, that is it, NFC East first
around the Horn.

Speaker 1 (48:42):
We're going to highlight notable changes and offenses for each
of the divisions beginning next week with Ken. Stay tuned
for that, everybody, and thank you for listening. Fantasy Football
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