Hey, Foot Clan Andy here and we got a surprise for you. It's a weekend release of a little bonus episode. In fact, a blast from the past every year we record a 10 things to remember episode. In fact, we recorded one on February 29th this year with 10 things we wanted to remember from the past season of Fantasy Football.
And we thought it would be a great time to give you a bonus episode, release it this weekend. And remember exactly what we remembered from the 2023 Fantasy Football season. We thought it would be helpful. So we're going to give you a bridge version of that episode starting right now.
To the Fantasy Footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Welcome in. Excited to have you with us the Fantasy Footballers podcast, Jason Moore, Mike, the Fantasy Hitman Wright. I'm Andy Holloway.
Welcome in one and all. We've got a fun show. The 10 things to remember episode. Fresh off of a, as far as I'm concerned, fantastic season of Fantasy Football.
Oh, great year. Great year. Right here. The year for the show.
Great year for me personally. Yeah. I mean, just I had a good time. So there's lots to remember.
I mean, Jason, you remember the playoffs and I remember my championship. I think Papa Josh, Papa Josh, you probably remember a lot from this past year too, right? I mean, you had a good time. It was a great time, except for the ending.
Yeah. So we're doing our 10 things to remember. Jason, did you, did all of your items this year on the show as we count them down later? Did they all come from your little black book?
Yeah, basically this year, it was one of those things where I wanted to remember them in the moment because we never, we were all goldfish other than Mike. That's why I don't even remember your championship from 2022. Right. Thank you.
You know, so it's like when I, when I see these lessons, in fact, one of the things that I am bringing up today was something I told Brooks on the show, mid show, I was like, Hey, Brooks, you got to remind me to bring this up on the things to remember because there was a lesson we had learned and I'm like, there's something I can't forget. I forgot all about it. So Brooks brought it up because his job, he was ordered to do it and he, you know, bade well. And so yeah, thank you.
So when Jay, when you are post-mortem, we'll put it that way, is, uh, use your little black book gonna be the thing that's auctioned off? Yeah, probably probably. Like, you know, you look at the celebrity stuff or like, just numbers and stats are in little notes or, or, or memoirs in there. No, it's all.
It's it's today. I got one for you. Okay. Today I traded CD layin for Jalen Waddle.
Yeah. It was that in there? No, less of a diary. Okay.
It's just pictures of stick, man. Yeah, there's nothing in that book, man. There's oh my gosh. That's the great trick.
All these years later, you've never written anything in it actually seen inside. So you don't know what the contents are. And someday after I die, you're gonna go over there and you're gonna open the book and you're gonna turn page by page. You're gonna say, this book is empty.
These are all blank pages. There's literally nothing in this book. There's a few brave heart quotes in there. Let's jump in.
Don't forget to remember these things. All right. Well, this should be fun. I'm looking forward to hearing what you guys have in store.
I have not previewed any of your different things to remember. Number 10. Number 10. Quarterback loyalty gets you zero fantasy points.
And that was really, really true this year. It's something to remember moving forward. Because last year we saw a resurgence in a willingness to draft some quarterbacks early, right? For that.
We just come off the Jalen Hurts, Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes here. And it kind of reminded me of like, you know, Aaron Rodgers had like a ton of seasons at number one. And so he felt like a completely sure thing where you would draft him for a number of years in fantasy. So there was some willingness last year, but I'm going to tell you right here, right now, if you draft a quarterback early or even in the middle of the draft, it is very natural to feel like you are committed to that player.
You're drafting a onesie position. So you only start one quarterback if you're non-superflex. And a lot of the times, you know, we spend months preparing for our draft and we think we have conviction about a certain player. And we take them.
And if you take a quarterback, you're naturally taking a big name, right? These are the headline makers in the NFL. They're the ones that make or break games. And so, you know, even if you're taking a Justin Herbert and needs a six quarterback off the board, that's a big name you feel committed to those players this year.
Patrick Mahomes was the number one quarterback off the board. He was the quarterback 19 from week eight on. Now, Josh Allen was great. Jalen Hurts pretty good.
Although it's slowed down at the end. Lamar Jackson was a quarterback 17 for a six game stretch. Joe Burrow, Justin Herbert both got hurt. Justin Fields missed time.
Trevor Lawrence was not good. The Sean Watson missed time. And was not good. And was not good.
If you show loyalty to players at the quarterback position for too long, you cost yourself. People won championships this year with that Prescott who really didn't start the year well at all was a 10th quarterback off the board in the late eighth round. And there were a lot of people who had to move on from players that they drafted. I mean, Russell Wilson was somebody that was a relatively interesting pick for people to make, you know, last year.
And if you had been loyal to Russell Wilson last year when you saw things going downhill in Denver, he was that cautionary tail then this year you had a number of those guys. Trevor Lawrence, I think would fit that mold a lot into the year so strong and people were probably starting Trevor Lawrence too long. Yeah, I think the best example from this last year of remember this for next year that things don't stay the same at the quarterback position is the Dak Prescott and to a conversation. Because the first five weeks of the seat, once you're five weeks in and you're going into week six, you feel like you understand everything.
You feel like, Oh, I got it. I know, I know who's what's what and to was like locked in every week. You've got to start him. He was the quarterback five.
Dak word of us. He was the quarterback 21. So you know, we know how the season's going to end to as a superstar in Dak sucks. And then if you played that out and you just stayed put and you had the loyalty, the brain loyalty to the quarterbacks that started hot or that you drafted high, it did not work out outside of Josh Allen.
Right. And even my homes, right? It wasn't just these like later picks like to and Dak, like my homes was the hardest on people. Yeah, because you felt completely stuck.
I know that, you know, a lot of people that had my homes also had C.J. Stroud, right? They picked them up off of the waiver wire and then it was like, I'm never going to start him over Patrick Mahomes like loyalty to the quarterback position year after year unless you hit on the one or two guaranteed MVPs of that year, which do fluctuate, right? It was Lamar.
But how many years have we had undue loyalty to Lamar that actually cost you? I mean, the first two years after his MVP campaign, people started him no matter what. And they literally lost games because of it. So have a willingness, I would say it's not a necessity that you pivot because of one bad game.
I'm not saying that. I'm saying having have a willingness and hold, you know, have a loose grip on the quarterback you draft be willing to play the field. And when you see these offenses change and become better, believe maybe a little bit that you can play those guys. Yeah, I'm actually hit the number.
Number nine, I'm going to move one of mine around because it kind of piggybacks on what Andy was talking about. And I'm saying for this one, don't get cocky. Your team always, always has to get better. And in what I'm saying in there is sometimes there are moves that you need to make that are not your typical move where we don't resource management of fantasy football.
I don't like the roster two quarterbacks. I don't like the roster to tie it in saying don't get cocky with the team that you have, even if you're having success. And because there could be players out there available for you that you feel like my team is good. I don't need that player.
I don't. And again, the piggyback here is I had the inverse of what the successful quarterback move was. I had two, I traded for two when when things were looking good. And I talked on this show about my belief that Dak Prescott was about to go on a huge run because the schedule looked so fantastic for him.
Dak was sitting on my waiver wire and I like I believed to my core of all my analysis that no, Dak is going to go on a run, but I don't need him because I have to I don't need to go pick up Dak and that was idiotic. Like I should have made if nothing else to block my opponents from getting a quarterback who I think is about to be fantastic. Thank you for not remembering them. I had one of those my I had a guy that was on fire.
He was catching fire four weeks in a row. Look like the real deal. His name was Josh Downs and you made me a very easy trade offer to get Michael Pittman for very cheap or very cheap. But your team was good.
I did not need to do it. I was solid. And had I done it, I think your season looks a lot different. Like sometimes that is I should have just picked up the second quarterback.
It's not a move I normally make, but I need to be prepared. Leaving more and more. I'm getting comfortable with the idea of leaving my draft with two tight ends. Just for week one, have a guy where that I believe in this player and then maybe a player where let's see what I like.
Let's see what happens. Let's talk about the beginning of the season. We did a and this is not supposed to be a full two thing was we always do an undrafted gems guy's for. They might be on your waiver wire after the draft is already over.
And I'm like, dude, Jake Ferguson and Sam LaPorte both of their schedules to open are basically the number one number two tight end schedule that we with the data we have. And both of those players went on to be really important and got off to pretty good starts. And it's your team is not as good as you think it is. It takes one tiny thing to go wrong.
And if you're not prepared in on already making moves night things for a get please. I'm just gonna give you another example, which is like a perfect example would be somebody who started the Earth Kenneth Walker and Travis ETN as their two running backs. It would be easy to say I got it figured out at the running back position and not add or not build some depth behind them and then boom. And that's my kind of final point here is talking about the your fab or your waiver priority.
You too often you as I'm talking about myself as well. I look at my roster. Well, I really need. I got to figure out this wide receiver problem I have.
I'm so good at running back. I'm not even worried. But the top two pickups of the week say are running backs. And then I don't go hard after them because I think I'm good at that position.
And someone else gets Kyron Williams in week one, you know, just as the easiest example because you think you're good. I don't need to go after Kyron. And that was an incredibly bad mistake because it just takes one injury to one of your two starting running backs and you're not don't get caught up and just don't don't get overwhelmed and fall in love with the smell of your own farts looking at your roster. Always be trying to improve it.
Yeah, it is. It is one of the great illusions of fantasy football that what you're staring at that perfect beautiful specimen of a roster in week four. That's for no. The greatest illusion is that you are going to get to see what that team will do in the playoffs because it doesn't happen.
It almost never happens. I cannot remember a team. I mean, my dynasty team last year, we were talking about how lucky I was getting with injuries week 10, 12, 13, and the shoe finally dropped, right? So yeah, it is a good thing to remember that when the roster looks nice, take a picture, but it's not going to last very long.
Yes. Prepare yourself. Number eight. This was called smell your own farts.
Good ain't bad. Sorry. That's right. Good ain't bad.
Remember that. Young stud players who have proven themselves on the NFL field, they're like, they came out and they're like, wow, that they're really good. They're sensational. They are not going to go away just because the team brings in depth and more talent.
And that's a lesson I needed to learn from this last year, specifically to two players who just mentioned Andy, Travis ETN and Kenneth Walker. Both of these teams went out and got a day two running back. High draft capital for running back. Tank Biggs becomes into Jacksonville.
And it was like both Travis ETN and Kenneth Walker prior to the NFL draft for guys we were really, really, really high on. You know what we did our early rankings shows and Kenneth Walker, he's just a stud. But then on in the second round, they go and draft Zack sharpening and you're like, he's ruined. Kenneth Walker's ruined.
What I got. Unreasonably mad. Yeah. Oh, yeah.
That was the madness you've been all year. I know exactly where I was. Like you remember the moment I remember the moment I was sitting in my office and the news came through. And I was a level of mad for a pretend game that I should not have reached.
Yeah, it's one of those things where I thought for sure that with that kind of draft capital coming in that these running backs would not usurp the talent, but just destroy it, just destroy the fantasy value. And obviously, you know, at the end of the year, Kenneth Walker got injured and and Travis ETN slowed down a bit. But that wasn't because of this back up that came in. They were both work horses.
They were both work horses because they proved themselves already. We saw the NFL team saw they look, if you dominate on the field, then you're you're good. You know, so I think about this year, like, well, who could that happen to like Kyron Williams dominated this last year? If they go out and spend a day to pick on a running back, I'm still going to be in on Kyron Williams.
The team needs depth. Every team needs depth. We just talked about, you know, don't rest on your worlds, you know, build, you're good at running back. No, you're never good at running back.
Go, go add someone. And that's true for NFL teams as well. So, Nico Collins, Pinkdale, there's been so many rumors of the Texans going out and getting a wide receiver in the draft or going after Mike Evans, if he becomes available, whatever the case is, it's like, I haven't come here last offseason. It seemed like he was set up for the worst scenario.
You're going to miss time. We like Henry Miller, yeah, Jamal Williams, and it's Alvin. David Montgomery, you know, they, they, they, it's been a huge draft capital. David Montgomery was still very good.
If you're a very good player, you're a very good player. And when I want to be less afraid this season about, oh, so and so added this player. So now my guy is ruined. No, if the guy's good, he's going to get his, the team is just better.
Who was ahead of Keishan Vaughn in Tampa? When that happened? Because I remember people being afraid of Keishan Vaughn in Tampa. Hey, but I don't remember who the starter was.
I don't know if it was, it was probably for Nat at the time. That I think that checks out. But I mean, that was, you know, draft season is very fun. The NFL, it's the bright lights.
It takes over the whole world. So I think it's very easy nowadays to lose perspective on the way a team is built and pays so much attention to six months worth of rookie and basketball drafts to lose sight of the fact that these players not only perform well on the field, but they also establish relationships with those teams. Oftentimes. So, yeah, it's a big time, good reminder to have.
And we'll take a quick break and be right back. Number seven. All right, let's, let's look at number seven here. I've titled it lose a trade.
When it tied. I'm excited for this one. Look, I have a bit of a reputation around these parts as being maybe an aggressive, persistent trader. Would you agree?
It's a that's a nice way to put it. Yeah, I mean, and one of the things that I think holds a lot of fantasy players up is they are unwilling to lose a trade, perceptively. And I think that that's a pride thing. It's obviously trying to do the work, right?
You're trying to make sure that you're on the perceived winning side. Everybody wants to win the trade, right? But what do we define winning the trade as? And, you know, for me this year, what I think is important is that you want to make sure that you're getting the difference making player on the roster.
We've talked about that before in two for one, three for one trades. But early in the season for me, what I recognized was that there were two players in my mind that were league winners definitively in fantasy football this year. And they were all on Ross St. Brown and CD lamb.
And I know that a lot of players that we have in our league opponents teams in our league, when you get into trade discussions, sometimes it's like they have to have the last word, right? They have to have the last tweet to the deal. They have to make sure that they have one little tweak or one little addition in it can disrupt the ability to get a trade done. And so the thing I want people to remember is they go into next year, if you have that conviction, the conviction that Mike had about Dak Prescott, the conviction that many of us have about certain players as you get halfway through the year, if you believe somebody's going to be a difference maker slash league winner, what I'm saying is it's be willing to go out and lose a trade in the public's perception, right?
In your league's perception to get the trade done because you're saying Vontay Mac, no matter what, yes, I'm saying you go, you go costner. If you have to go, I don't care if I would have a trade up to number one, right to do it. But you know, just don't matter what. Don't get bogged down in the tiny minutia details.
Don't get bogged down in the little asks in the pesky additions to the trade. If you want to get these players that are very hard to get, for me, it was waiting for a couple of teams to kind of get on the fringe of contention and then throw the kitchen sink at them to guarantee that I can get one of these players onto my roster. You know, we've talked about the philosophy, obviously, if you do a two for one, three for one, trade, you get to go right to the waiver wire and pick up a couple extra names. If you've traded three for one, I think sometimes people get worried that they're going to be criticized for the trade that they make.
But if you have the conviction, like I did that CD Lam was a must add, if I wanted any chance at a championship, be willing to lose the trade in the public perception if you want to win a title. It can make the difference. Don't get bogged down. It's not like every player at the moment a trade is being made is going to play the exact same way the rest of the season.
I think sometimes people just get stuck and that's why deals don't get done. Yeah, that's fair. Sometimes it's because we're just cowards. Yeah, and I think that that is, it's like the fear of the loss is more powerful than the potential of the victory.
But we're not playing to win second or third. And I think it's really important to be willing to throw something else in to get the player you need. And it's, I would even tack on a thing at the end of it, be willing to lose, perceptually lose the trade and just be willing to be at the end of the day, swing, like you may be wrong. I mean, it works for you this time.
Yeah, you can think is but I've done those trades and they get hurt the next week. I mean, that kind of stuff happened. The point of you're playing to win, you're playing for first place, you're not playing for second, you're not playing for third. So you have to be willing to take some gigantic swing because if you strike out, whatever, man, it's not the difference between, but if you hit, it's you're talking about a forever championship, you are is very hard to win a title.
Very, very difficult. Number six. All right. If the risk is, this is not a catchy title, but it's just it's right to the point.
If the risk is already built into the ADP, don't be afraid. And we have too many players every single year that we're all nervous about a new situation that has happened to that player. But it's the it's fantasy football is the game of economics and things that happen. We get afraid to draft players, their ADP goes down.
And now the risk of everyone being correct, it's already baked in there. It's our it's already in there with some examples. So the fond eggs with Minnesota was an emerging player where his final three years with the team, what finished as wide receiver 20 in 14 games wide receiver 11 and 15 21 in 15 games. He gets traded to the Buffalo Bills, which I still think at the time, with the information we had, Josh Allen did not look like a franchise quarterback.
He was coming off of, I believe, two straight years of being the most inaccurate quarterback in the league. And so we all got nervous about the fun digs who the fun digs looked like a rising superstar who just got banished to a land of mediocrity. And at that time then he was going in the sixth round as the wide receiver 27. And he has a massive breakout campaign.
He has a Josh Allen has the huge massive breakout campaign. So those that had the courage, which that my point being it was not really courage. We were all scared to draft him and he went in the sixth round. He drafted as wide receiver 27.
It's like a real Jameson Williams type of risk. That's what I was talking about earlier. It's like it's baked in if he's a nice and that's why I'm in. I'm like, I'm drafting a situation when he's on the ninth.
If I'm wrong, I don't really lose anything. Jamar Chase has a rookie in 2021. It's laughable at this point. The risk was baked in.
He was being drafted in the seventh as well. Oh gosh. And that seems that seems so ridiculous that that kind of that kind of impossible that we were also done. We let him go into the seventh.
He had a lot of drops in pretty good. And he couldn't catch the ball. And yet he just like Jameson Williams was 81 for nearly 1500 yards and 13 touchdowns. Gino Smith takes over as the quarterback for the Seattle Seahawks.
Russell Wilson's out. There's panic in the streets. DK Metcalf who was just a wide receiver 12 was being drafted in the back of the fourth title. Lockett who was the wide receiver 13 previously plummets to the wide receiver 40 because it's impossible.
We these guys can't there's no way to do it with Gino Smith. They're both fantastic. Mike Evans this past year. The risk is if it's baked into the ADP, you have you have very little to lose and you have so much to gain.
It's a lot like the way the stock market moves when you're talking about the risk or the situation is baked in because in those situations exactly, people had played the season out already in their minds. Yeah. And then come up with the worst possible outcome for all of those players. And then that's exactly where you're drafting them.
That's you know, it looks nice now. But that's why Mike Evans was the strongest I've ever been convicted about a my guy ever, which I told you guys that in the studio. It was like that on the show. And it was because he was so undervalued and everyone had anticipated a guarantee that this is how the season will play out with Baker Mayfield.
There was just not a lot of risk to me in, you know, turning to a player like that. And those examples you brought up are great ones. And identifying those in draft season, you know, more of a challenge, you know, trying to find those players that because they're scary. Yeah, they already they should be scared.
And it feels when you're when you're there and you're at their ADP, you're like, am I going to be the guy to draft this player that's fallen so far from where they were? Like, doesn't that mean they're all busted and I've got to be wiser? But but you're right. Like if the risk of them failing means they finish where you're drafting them.
Right. Great. There's only upside. Number five, number five draft enigmatic backs.
Say that again. Draft enigmatic backs. That's one word. That's one word.
That's now enigmatic backs. You want to draft enigmatic backs and what I mean by that trademark. Yeah. Go to that.
That domain enigmatic backs. In that is enigmatic back fields are scary. The ones where you just don't know who's the guy. I don't know the situation there.
But yeah, so I just I don't want to go in. Yeah, like someone else figured out exactly someone else will figure out this. We're not even sure who the running back is. So I don't want to take the shot and then just burn the pick.
But the thing is, is most of those back fields don't cost you a heavy pick. And there are always emerging assets from that type of backfield where you're not sure who it is. If you look at this last year, you had the Miami Dolphins, you had a new undersized rookie in Devani and coming in and you had a super veteran and Rene Mostert is at the office. But I don't know.
I don't know who the guy is. I don't I'm just going to let someone else draft him. That's why they were drafted as the running back 42 and the running back 45 turns. They were it was okay because they finished as the running back 24 and the running back to even if they hadn't even if we're he most or had not finished as a running back to of course hindsight is so easy.
But looking back, we all had kind of projected Miami would be a high powered office and it's someone someone running back is going to score it will not be the running back 40 something. But you didn't know who it's going to be. How would you draft him? Just take take your shot and maybe you're wrong like this next backfield.
I was wrong on this backfield but I don't I don't have any problem right admitting that because I saw I saw the shot for one of these enigmatic backfields the Rams, Cam Akers and Kyron Williams you had Dan Graziano on August 4th right this quote they look at Cam Akers and Kyron Williams as their top two backs likely in that order. The Rams believe both can pass protect but they like Williams a little more as a pass protector than they do acres. So what acres is likely the nominal starter Williams could carve out a role and be the guy they lean on in the run game if something were to happen. So it's like one of those something happens.
Yeah something happened. I like acres he was running back 21 that didn't work out but Kyron if you took him which some people drafted him very late or most people picked him up off of waivers obviously we know what happened there he was a sensational superstar. You've got these situations and it's not always like the Kyron Williams and where he most are number one back coming out but the commanders last year is going to Gibson is going to be Brian Robinson you know they were drafted Brian Robinson was drafted as the running back 36 because of that it's like you know it's a muddy backfield and you always you pretty much because of the value of the workhorse the Christian McCaffries and the SACWON Barclays you're only looking for like that and I think that's sometimes a mistake because there's only a few of them but there's a lot of running backs you need so it's okay to take part of a committee where you're not sure who's going to be the lead guy because it's probably a value in the draft and they will rise out of that Brian Robinson finished as a top 24 running back. Well I think especially in the cases of Miami in Los Angeles the extra layer there is that you have teams that you had tremendous confidence in the running game.
You didn't know which running back it would be but you knew that the Rams could run the football you didn't know which running back it would be in Miami but you knew that they were going to have an offense that could run the football and so I think if you wanted to add an extra qualifier there you could say like enigmatic backfields you know on teams you know on teams that have a history of being successful or coaches that would be successful there. All right well move on. Number four. It is my turn right?
It is. If it's not it is now. Well look hey I'll be quick. I've titled this one The Little Things Kill.
It's my favorite bushel. That is from a bushel. Yeah. That is your favorite things.
It's just little things. All right and look this is the 10 things to remember. This is something that I literally did halfway through this season and the reason I'm bringing it up in part is we are going into season 10 next year at the fantasy footballers and you know I think that there's probably a few people that are a little bit like me in our League of Records where ugly ugly smelly smelly what else you got guys what else do you got guys? Too tall bad clothes very much too tall.
Um smelly we're not really setting it up really smelly. You started off real hot. Look I had a couple of championships early in the League of Records and if you were listening to the show for a long time maybe maybe you started to take your league over like I thought I was and about halfway through this year I look I've been in the midst I was in the midst of a pretty decent drought of winning championships in League of Records. I had had so much success me and my played each other in championship games three straight years a long time ago things just felt easy for a while and then they didn't you want to know why because we started giving them our information.
Yeah we started a podcast and told them all of our information but the truth is that many of you maybe you had success early on listening but the competition does get better in your leagues and I wasn't honestly I wasn't willing to accept that. I believe that if I just kept going on the exact same way it would just all work out like it always had. I had grown a little bit complacent and I had to have a meeting about four or five games this year with myself and it was literally I did schedule I did schedule I did say my Google calendar. Was there a mirror?
No zoom. Oh yeah incredible. So there was zoom in a mirror. Right.
Yeah. So look I had the one I want meeting with myself and I said like I can't keep doing the same thing I've always been doing. I have to pay attention to the little things if I want to get back over the hump for me that meant a little extra free agent prep every week which look on the show we try to help you with a little bit more persistence on the trade offers or finding those players I think can be League winners. Sometimes it's not just about trading a bunch sometimes it's about doing the work to figure out who you need to trade for not activity that doesn't lead anywhere doesn't help you.
I'm sometimes just paying a little bit more attention to some of the dirty work that's not very fun like playoff schedules for players and future schedules for players. Some stuff is more fun and fantasy than others but it all helps those little things help lead to victories and they add up over time and so I think a lot of us here maybe we've had success in the past maybe you're like man I want to title but it's been four or five six years what am I doing wrong? For me it was the little things it was a willingness to reevaluate a few small areas and it led to success this year it's obviously very difficult to win in fantasy so I think those things do add up the little things kill got the went back to the fundamentals yeah really doing his push-ups grind in that's right yeah it was the meeting though it was the one on one yeah yeah so basically things remember schedules on self-meeting self-meeting self-meeting self-meeting self-meeting self-meeting number three let's talk a little dynasty fantasy football here when I call this one know the thresholds hmm as in dynasty one of the harder things to make a decision on is young wide receivers who aren't immediately superstars when do I know when do I know that this I I drafted a lemon and I need to move on when do I know I got to give somebody some patience here like James and Waynes do we need to give him patience to grow into the player that the lions hoped for when they drafted him okay and so we talk about targets a lot on this show as it's an earned statistic as if a player is is getting open is building that trust with their quarterback they're going to get a target a route gives context to just the opportunity that the team is giving but players can be out there mv style running routes on every single play cardio king getting like three targets a game and I you now see where mv says he is looking for a new job because they're saying sir you have not earned enough targets we need to look elsewhere and so we looked back over the last decade these are what wide receivers drafted in the first three rounds because still draft capital is the king of signal to will a player actually be good or not so here here are the metrics this is a little heavy in statistics but bear with me through two years on average a first round wide receiver averages about a 20 target per route run and a 1.68 yards per route run second round wide receivers their yards per route run at about 1.55 on average and the third round wide receivers at 1.4 now these are simply benchmarks to help guide your decisions it is not saying if a player is under it they are 100% toast but it's you may want to think about this because honestly through the last decade the only player who has really resurrected himself from the grave was Devonta Adams Devonta Devonta Adams through two years remember how hard I was on him oh we were always like he never had a thousand yards season because he was at 997 yeah I mean it wasn't even just that it was the first two years it looked terrible for him I believe it was year two that Geordie tore his ACL like right the beginning of the year it was thank goodness they have Devonta Adams it's your time and he did not come through so it was now this is never going to work out and now Devonta Adams over the last however long has been one of the best wide receivers in the league so we're going to take a look back of what we've seen now this is two years ago because you're collecting the data at the top of the class Drake London Olabe Garrett Wilson they're at the benchmarks we're not worried about it both Christian Watson and George Pickens are sitting above the threshold and they're volatile definitely I don't know if we're going to see them turning to studs but we're okay Watson and Pickens yes on Christian Watson here's now where it gets a little sketchier we're calling this one keep the light on because there could be some hope so maybe if you're there on your roster you're just in a hold position Jameson Williams he is at one the light on he is at 1.42 yards per route run which is under the threshold we want again the threshold is just a kind of a level that you're hoping they're above Treland Berks he's at 1.28 he's a sketchier and Wandao Robinson he's there with Jameson Williams at 1.14 honestly just putting Jameson Williams with those other two guys really it does not give me a lot of comments for Jameson Williams yeah highlights where I don't believe in those other two at all keep a dim light on you know I mean like don't at the top of that group right he is he's tied with one day but one day was also not a first round wide receiver so he's over performing good pair of Jameson Williams uh John Dodson is on the cliff yeah he's the next tier that looks scary and then the guys where you're just where you I think you can pretty actively say goodbye just move on unfortunately John Metchee he's Texans type one Thornton out Pierce Skynmore and the Sky people uh why we've won valus Jones in here that's just mean to him uh Jalen Tolbert and David Bell who once upon a time was hope to be the next guy for the game day Bell sitting in our dynasty uh waiver wire if anyone's interested but we have a we do have a huge article coming out here highlighting all the thresholds and things but it's just it's a metric in the dynasty pass it's in the dynasty pass yeah thank you it's a it's a metric for you to be aware of because what's nice about dynasty wide receivers when you draft them even when they stink in their first year more often than not they at least hold their value like Skynmore was it was atrocious that first year and there was so many glaring red but now the nbs is going well somebody wearing red sign saying it's not gonna work for Skymore I know the draft gap was there I know the team is there it doesn't look like it's gonna work but the hope was still there like there was still things of you could trade Skymore over that first offseason I'm not sure you're gonna be able to trade Skymore uh this far into the process so be aware how a wide receiver where they were drafted compared to how they're performing through the first two years to help you make a real educated decision about do I wait this out or do I try move you know and I'm sure like you said in that article to get into all the details I think the big headline that I took away from that from practical advice was that if you pay attention to those thresholds you know whether or not your belief in a player is is justified by the metrics or is going to be an uphill battle like I think that's what fundamentally I would be saying like if this player does break out and have success from this point forward they will be doing something that is unexpected and that is saying something for the odds are not in their faith yeah historically speaking it's it's so wild how you can look back in history and find these numbers you know they still like they hold true yeah the skynmore example is the example because we knew it we talked about these metrics about how he was on the field of the rookie quite a bit and he was really really bad in that in that uh you know turgis per out run and yards per out run and so it's like it you know it never works out I mean these people somehow delude themselves into thinking it might but but it might work for us let's get back in here again people always think of it but that's the time to get out because because there were people still thinking it's gonna work there's a Tobias funk in your in your league right now who you can find one of these metrics and trade a wide receiver to them we'll take another quick break and come back Jason I'll be ready number two all right thanks broxy this is the broxy special I call it the pre-season pretenders don't get fooled I give every year we get fooled so hard not to it's so hard because we're so excited for football and we want to see things and I went back I we want to trust people Jason we want to trust people and we want things to matter in the pre-season well I think it's a go on we watch his games all the signs we're looking for something that matters because I mean one that's our job like when pre-season rolls around I'm watching these games whether I want to watch but not and I'm trying to look for something tangible and and I need to remember to stop I need to stop we do so much research through the offices we have so much historical data we we go through so many training camp reports that are that are in depth and and and long winded and watched coaching press conferences and and we develop as solid of opinions as we can based on the information we have this last year I was so out on Damien Pierce we had like three shows where I had a tangent on how that fourth round running back you know yeah we argued about it yeah it just doesn't work and then a new regime came in and brought in a Devan Singletary a veteran running back who's a quality back like oh man I was so out on like you talking about Kyron now though I would have been saying that there he goes to the Rams yeah well I've got two things to remember yeah so yeah I mean and then all of a sudden a pre-season game oh oh baby eighty nine percent of CJ Strauts now to pre-season week two went to Damien Pierce he's the dude he's gonna be the pass catcher but he was not and I got fooled in Andy thank you I had the 12th pick in that draft because I was the reigning champ and yeah I took Damien Pierce thank you but I was I was totally gonna take Damien Pierce I was so angry with Damien Pierce because of because of because of just a pre-season game and let me illustrate how the pre-season game is not always indicative of future success the Steelers offense was amazing in pre-season the Steelers first team offense had five touchdowns on five drives in pre-season they looked great Jerome Betas to talk about Kenny Pickett as a potential to be a superstar but he was not a superstar there are so many you know examples of this the the Javante Williams injury that we knew the timeline like we knew it we knew it couldn't work out and that one still hurts my feelings we knew it's just like medically impossible for him to be a rock star but he got out in pre-season he played and it was like if you now we do learn things from time to time for pre-season who was the orange Julius Thomas yeah Julius Thomas we we saw that break out coming because of pre-season utilization the tight end that year but what it wasn't it was it wasn't a change of strongly formed and informed decisions that we had made over the entire offseason if you have a really well informed opinion that you believe in based on a lot of evidence don't let I'm talking about self-reading it on my zoom tank tank big big big it was another one yeah because it was like you know you guys you know he had an opportunity in the pre-season look pretty good i really want to play into your earlier one but i do not overemphasize pre-season that's that's the key because you do need to emphasize it it's just a matter of like in fantasy football i think our tendencies because we want stuff to talk about is that you go from witnessing something to making a pronouncement about it rather than just factoring it in right like you could say look i'm not really believer in Damien Pierce he's looked pretty good this pre-season but fundamentally this is still my concern but it's easy it's so easy to go from well we were wrong he's got it this coach loves it but yeah i mean it is uh i'm going to de-emphasize because my natural my natural human nature will automatically emphasize everything i see it was just it's just no way i'm gonna go in and try to de-emphasize this just saying your head to say you sure about that yeah with whatever you see every you sure about that yeah sure about that this one um okay and yeah there are many examples of situations like that the pre-season you got vanilla offenses right and defense you know defense and you get different uh first team second teams playing each other i think in part the pre-season has become less and less of an indicator over time as well we produce the total amount of games we don't play starters very much we want to see different things from different players and you go out there and you're not executing what you know a normal game player it used to be the third week of the pre-season you're seeing two teams really prepare for the season with their main person now you've got to do heavy research even to see like wait okay is this player going to get the first team defense or is this is that corner back there they're back up you know it's like yep no it makes sense it makes sense all right we got one more because we always share one at the end here number one now Jason you titled this one yeah well i'm a big fan of the movie remember the titans yeah that is a this is a show about remember okay i want you to remember the turds remember the turds remember the turds in your league so what are we saying we're saying that uh i don't know what we're saying why we don't yeah i mean we could have said it differently i suppose but uh this is the reminder that the things in your league that cause you to have a bad experience which may include a handful a couple single it's all sorts of turds uh but if there's some managers in your league that didn't add to the experience if there were rules in your league league formation settings uh week 17 or 16 or 18 championship games sorry week 18 title games this is the time to kind of remember what went right what went wrong make the adjustments get them in place maybe there's leagues that you were saying man i wish our league was like that league over there or i wish that this one manager set their lineup ever this is the time to make the adjustments to uh to boot out those turds and to get things right for your league lace up them boots now i usually uh go with the flush oh we could have flushed the turds but i you see you guys know we don't know you're actually like drop kicking a poo i'm drop kicking it straight from the source never it's never it's incredible really that's that's quite the image yeah yeah it's a backwards kick oh it's like a mule kick yeah it's a mule kick yeah what i'm camping you gotta boot up the turns when you're camping well i'm not doing it all my god i'm gonna be ready wait you do this for yourself this is a joke just no i know he's like stop stop you're the one who said camping well i mean you're also really kick turns you know i mean you're doing good brix how you doing oh yeah oh i'm doing great did you learn anything from that last one that's that was the most important one that was definitely yeah it's anything you uh you uh you need to remember i don't put you on the spot there's anything from this past year that uh like do you remember you guys how old your dianisty team is yeah start remember that um just in general not playing afraid which a lot of your guys's points summarize that that's my problem like was out of trades and i go to get off or i don't offer them you know i i think that's i think that's a good self-adknowledgement because i look at several people in our league and it's usually the people that are hard to trade with and i just watched i literally watched them hurt themselves like it's annoying i'm annoying that they don't accept the straight or can't trade with anybody but like i often think like i feel like you're like pre-setting them up like no i genuinely have had the thought before of like dude you you are such a coward that you don't help your team with the trade with you no no no no specifically all these cowards i'll take out not taking my deals take my trade coward that's a good trade method that's often work what do you what do you chicken do a yellow um i can do attach to players certain players you know what that's i have that problem too brook that's a really easy thing to do um with these long off seasons where you fall in love with certain players it's my it's my beautiful fantasy baby i found it feels better when you find them i made you feels better when you find them and then they have success and they're yours yeah no question all right and that was a a blast from the past and thanks to remember from our february 29th episode earlier this year we wanted them front of your mind as you head into 2024 as you get ready for your drafting for your season and so we thought we delivered you a little bonus episode this weekend hopefully you enjoyed it and we'll catch you with a brand new episode coming to you on monday thank you for listening to another episode of the fantasy footballer's podcast join our fantasy football community on jointhefoot.com and follow us on twitter at the ff ballers