The Show: Toughest Players to Rank, Running Back ADP, and More

This is an I Heart Podcast. Guaranteed Human. You're about to listen to the Late Round Fantasy Football Show which originally aired on YouTube. If you'd like to catch the show live this off season, you can head to the Late Round Fantasy Football YouTube channel youtube.com/atlateroundFF. We'll be live each Wednesday at noon eastern. Without further ado, here's this week's episode. [Music] Welcome in, welcome in. I don't know. You know that transition. I was like killing myself. Like, what do I, like, got to be, got to be bottom three intro for you on this show. It was, it was, it was, it felt like, here's what it felt like. It felt like Ron Burgundy a little bit. Fortunately audio listeners will not hear that intro. Yeah. Because you always, for people who only listen to audio, kitchen just does like a very quick, like, welcome in type thing and you know, it says hi and what we're going to talk about. That one felt like, because I've been there, trust me. That one felt like you had literally two, you were thinking about something completely different while you were talking about that. Like you were, you were thinking about your daughter's basketball camp or something while you were doing that intro. Well, we do a little bit behind the scene. I don't mean this is a bad way. I mean, I mean, I mean, this is in a constructive criticism way. [Laughter] I usually give you a thumbs up. And so I was going to give you a thumbs up and then I see you are alive. And then it was like, I forgot. When we were a little late, so I was just trying to go as fast as I could with the story. Yeah. So I like, in my mind, I was thinking of, okay, because I always do welcome in, welcome in. And the second part, when the first part, it's what's up everybody. And so that threw me off. I'm sorry. The good news. Hey, it'll get better from here. The good news is that it doesn't matter because this is the show that we just hang out and we chill and we talk some ball. You know what they're spreadsheets. Okay, just before we get into it, into need to let everybody know, then go to latrown.com for the membership. The all-access membership. People are loving it. You can also pre-order the draft guide. And on that, JJ, I will let you make the big announcement for the draft guide this year. Yeah, look, so the draft guide has typically gone out July 1st historically. We've had a lot of change in things going on with latrown fantasy football this year with the Cadulla hire with some introduction to some metrics with big, I mean, the biggest news being, you know, a side from Brandon. I mean, the biggest product related news being the website. And, you know, there's been some work done with that even after the website launched. It's not like we like launched the website and now everything's done. In fact, it's more stressful and tenuous now than it was when before the website launched. So with all that being said, we need a little bit of extra time. Plus, I think we should probably just do this moving forward with the draft guide in general. Because every time I publish the guide on July 1st, there's like an immediate regret of some of the players that are like listed in there and like how we, you know, so early. So the draft guide this year is being launched on July 10th. And I understand if that is frustrating to some people. But I want to make sure that what you're getting is bigger and better than the last. And I think that the way to get to that point is if, you know, I'm just given that extra like week and a half to make sure we're crossing our teas and dotting our eyes and that the analysis is up to the standard that, you know, I tried to place for the analysis that I do. So draft guide July 10th, you will get tons of stuff in it. I mean, I'm already doing some analysis on these positions and it's different type of analysis. And I've done before there's more information than we've ever done before. And there's a different structure to this guide than the previous guys you guys have read that I think. It's one of the reasons why I want to be conservative with this launch date, as opposed to just being like, yeah, same date because there is like brand new stuff in a brand new. We're rebuilding the guide from the ground up. Yeah, essentially, essentially. Yes. And so I just want to be smart with it. And the best way to be smart with it is to make the official launch date July 10th. You know, this is part of the reason my last week we're talking like we didn't have a true date necessarily. And it's really not going to change, I think, anyone's plans in redraft and season long this year. Unless you were on vacation wanting to read something over the 4th of July. That's really what this comes down to. But now I got that long weekend or you know that holiday to do a parade, do some stuff with the family and then immediately go back to the office and grind out some of this draft guide. Yeah. And honestly, I think that the weekend after July 4th is a good time to release it's still no one's drafting their redraft teams in the first of July. Now some people like to get you know, just like an early head start. I will say this though, we have never put out as much free content as we are doing right now. So between all the shows, between all the newsletters, you are still going to get your fill of preseason draft material to go over. I promise. Yes. And obviously people in chat are being very kind and respect like just just being, you know, like understanding the situation. But yeah, like if you really want rankings, like they're on the site and you can see the time stamp from when they were last updated and such. We did a little bit of an update today. I didn't like, you know, we're still in the process of figuring out the best way to communicate some of the updates and stuff like that. But regardless, like the redraft stuff, bestball stuff, if you guys want to play draft kings and you know, build a download a CSV for best ball rankings, whatever the case may be. That's all on the site. You know, this guide is very much more of a deep dive into how to find breakouts, what to look for in buss and, you know, your individual like draft plan. It's one of the bigger things that I'm trying to do differently this year is build out like a more concrete draft plan for people as opposed to the way that it's done, been done historically, which is like game theory, position analysis, no within the position analysis, I'm giving you the draft strategy, but there is an entire section that's going to be built that is on the draft strategy side. So I know it sounds crazy because it's, it feels like June is like it would be like a dead time for fantasy analysts, but I do more content in June or it's hardest for me in June. Then probably any other month because I had just finished up the prospect guide and all the prospecting work, there's a little bit of a law in May, but then immediately it's got to be draft guy time, and then it's becoming a best ball bro we're doing and you know, I'm not trying to get anyone to feel bad for me. Trust me, don't feel bad. It's just that there's a lot of work. And so I want to be realistic about what I can and can't do and I'm not trying to. You know, this is a, this is a family program, so I'm not going to say the half half a word this, this thing, this thing in this project. So Davis was on here, he would have no problem Davis was on, it was a matter of perspective last week and he made a rich work. I think a lot of people understandably are used to like going on like the the brochures where they just swear up a storm and like people would be shocked when they if they were to meet me, IRL and you know, the way that I or even just talking me on discord if we're being honest, but. But like, yeah, I mean, like I understand the people listening to this show, while they're they got kids in the car probably so I try to try to hold off on some of the swear. Of course, yeah, I get it. Hey, you know what I actually asked my daughter, you ever ask your daughters, if they know like, you know, bad words and stuff, you know, like you know, I don't know. Oh, it's so you if you're if you're a parent, you should ask your kid like in a genuine like, do you know any bad words and my daughter sweet sweet Avery. She said she did say that that she knew a she double hockey stick, yeah, but then she said, I said, okay, the more or something like that one, she goes, I know an F word and I go, well, what is it rhyme with right and she goes, Mick and I'm like, Mick. I was like, you can just say it and she's like, frick and I'm like sweet girl, please, please stay seven eight years old forever. So two nights ago we'll get into to news and it is actually, but this is important two nights ago, I introduced the girls to go. And I'm like, oh, it's PG. There's like I looked up of like this cannot be PG and in the 80s, it was PG, you know, now it's it had like 70 swear words. Yeah, it's funny. I feel like I feel like people feel like it's gone in the opposite direction, but I think that it has not. Yeah, yeah, I do not remember this, but anyways, they love goonies. Uh, Chunk and Slauth were their favorites and I feel like they, they got to live a little with that with that. All right, you mentioned draft Kings earlier, just a reminder that we love draft Kings and we appreciate them sponsoring the show. And you can get in the draft one, get one or as we call the dogo. Um, for the best ball millio make it. No, I made it up, but it is draft one get. It is draft one get one, but I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I go. So you get a bonus ticket for your second entry and again, if you want to see all the terms and conditions and the link to go get that you can use promo code late round or click the link in the description. And we love and appreciate you draft. So with that being said, JJ, you ready to get on to it? Do it. All right, let's do it. It's today's news. Today's fantasy news. All right, first on the list, Rome's foot was not built in a day. Boy, we have, we had a very concerning message last week about Rome, a Dunes, a foot and how he's adjusting to like the bone structure. I don't even, I really don't even understand it. All I know is this past week, there's been a lot of doctors like doctors and pretending to play doctor as it relates to your fantasy squad. So I want to know what your take is on Roma Dunes, a because even like in Best Bullets, his, his ADP just started dropping. Yeah, I mean, it sounds like given what doctors are saying on Twitter that it's probably not the biggest deal in the world. Like it's he can probably play to his normal self. But it's interesting because apparently when these like bone injuries can occur, the way they like, look, I know nothing about this. But the way they like grow back can just they can just grow back in these like calloused ways, like these like really strange like. And so if anyone wants to be grossed out, just google keen and Allen shoulder and you'll see what that if you can probably pull it up on the show if you want to a kitchen. But yeah, keen and Allen shoulder did the same thing. But the difference obviously is that keen and Allen is is that is shoulder. It's not his foot, which is a big deal because you know, you need your feet very much. So here I just put I put it in the or no, you have a different sheet up. No, there it is. I just put it up in front of a in front of everything. Keenan Allen has like a like a big lump on his shoulder. So I think there's like a small thing going on with a with a Dunes day's foot in that way. I don't know. I feel like technology can like carve out a little area for his for his little, you know, bone growth that's going on. I'm trying not to overstate it. I think that if he's falling by like half around to a full round and ADP, I'm going to probably gobble him up in my bare stacks. Speaking of keen now, this is not on the news list, but someone unearthed a picture of a like some sort of cover. I don't know what is a cover for like a like a almost look like an into those switch covers of like that. But it was someone did it for him. He had requested it and it was in Chargers colors. That would that would just be really gross for some teams out there for fancy. Yeah, for fantasy. We came back. All right. This also was another report last week is that kiddo report. Lee is going to be George Kiddles. Report. They're going to be ready for week one. It sounds like his tear wasn't like his Achilles wasn't as like bad as what others have been. Right. And so I don't doubt that this would be the case. I think that we're probably not going to see 100% kiddo. But he's apparently been ahead. I think that you can probably draft him at ADP right now more comfortably. And I probably need to move him up my rankings, you know, as a result of a lot of the reports and such. I played it. I played it a little bit conservatively with Kiddles. I don't think that it's going to like only he's going to rise so so dramatically, you know, in the next week necessarily. But I do think that we're going to just see him naturally continue to rise higher and higher in ADP as the good news comes through. So yeah, I mean, it sounds like that he's ahead and then also the injury itself wasn't as bad as what some of the other ones have been. Okay. This next one. And this is that time of year where we're getting I speculation we're getting coach like you know coaches press conference quotes and we're trying to decipher this isn't an excellent example because there is a report on Roto world that you know they are. Basically, Jonathan Brooks has a path to RB one. Yeah. For the Panthers. Another report said that he's going to be playing the Rico data role like Rico played in weeks one and two last year. I don't know what to believe and do it and we do just the fight for this stuff. I think this is just the nature of beat writers doing like what they're supposed to do, which is give us, you know, an idea of the direction. And usage of some of these players, but when it comes to player like Jonathan Brooks, who is coming off these like bad injuries, you know, we haven't seen him even playing the NFL really, you know, just a handful of snaps at this point. A lot of it is like some beat reporters are going to be more on the projection front and more bullish and others are going to be more conservative and not assume that things will be all butterflies and rainbows. Here's what I think I think of Jonathan Brooks were to be a hundred percent healthy. If we just assume he's fully healthy, nothing's wrong with him going into the season. I would argue that his maybe this is a hot take his ADP and true Behobrids ADP would be flipped. Where we would be more because the way the fan I talked about this with Pat Korean a little bit on becoming a best ball bro. The fantasy community has gotten sharper where they've recognized that once you get into like round six, round seven, and you know that that part of your draft, you really don't need to worry about floor nearly as much as you think or what they've historically thought so back in the day, you know, pat brought up the mic Davis example. We had Alexander Madison, we had Zameer white we have these players where people were very much drafting for floor rather than ceiling and I say that because there was some projectable volume for those players, but we knew those players weren't necessarily very good or at least had a backbone of being really, really good. And so now what we're seeing and so in the past we would see a you know, Bay shawl Tutant type or even like I think that five years ago and I'm going to say this in the mailbag episode to this week, I think that five years ago. Travelling Henderson, Ramondra Stevenson's ADP would be would be flipped than what they are right now. I think that the fantasy community would be drafting Ramondra Stevenson ahead of Traveon Henderson five years ago versus right now right. And so the hard part is is that me as an analyst and my job back in the day was easier because I could sit here and be like yeah draft Bay shawl Tutant in the seventh or eighth round of course do that you know draft Traveon Henderson. Traveon Henderson's a better value than Ramondra, well I can't say that right now, you know, like I like Bay shawl Tutant a lot and I know we're going to talk about him. I like Traveon Henderson's upside, you know, but I actually have been drafting more Ramondra Stevenson at his ADP than Traveon Henderson at his. Right. Yeah. And so it's and look this is definitely best ball driven to a degree like we'll see how things settle in season long. But what I'm basically saying here is is that I do think that you know the the overall landscape with running back right now that people are are being like I think that given the injury stuff with Jonathan Brooks. He would be going way later than he is right now in most other seasons, but if you were 100% I do think their ADPs would be flipped because people recognizing the upside of that individual player. And I think the upside exists with Jonathan Brooks more than it does Chuba Hubbard at this point. Chuba Hubbard's fine, but fine doesn't win fantasy championships, you know, it's just Chuba Hubbard needs that backfield to himself to be able to really pay off as like an elite like big big hit right. Whereas like Bay Shaltoton can just be better right as we like to must prospect he obviously is in a good environment and now there's stuff going on around him. Traveon Henderson could realistically just get more work and be really explosive and just hit in a big way. I don't think Chuba Hubbard. I think we know enough about Hubbard that he's probably not going to be that and so he needs that extra help. But if Jonathan Brooks would be 100% healthy, we can tell ourselves that story about Jonathan Brooks. And that's why I think his ADP would be a lot higher. So that's why these beat reporters in my opinion are looking at this in a way where they're like Brooks has the upside to be a legit like player in this offense, right. That's what probably all of them believe, but one of them might be sitting there saying he's not healthy right now. I can't assume that he's going to be you know, de lead back, but another one saying like no, I've seen him so far in practice and he's looked really good. He looks healthy. Therefore I'm going to project this a little bit right. So I don't think that like either beat reporters wrong because I think that's just part of range of outcomes. You know, that's what we talk about in preach all the time. It's just in fantasy football when you're getting to that part of your draft range of outcomes wise, you probably will want to lean towards the upside guy. And that in my opinion, the upside guys Jonathan Brooks. So I'm drafting more Jonathan Brooks at his ADP. I haven't really drafted that much Chuba at his ADP, but I think Brooks at his ADP even as it's rising is a pretty good pick. Okay. We had a some reports out of Seattle about the Zach Sharman a I want to Greg Bell said this. There's a few other beat reporters, but I do want to give a shout out to Zane. Denonnie. I hope I pronounce his last name right, but DHA in a N I Z I N. He is he is crushing it as one of those things JJ where you've talked about in just like an industry thing like find something that people need. And so he has what he's doing like the thing with what Zane's doing so you guys can find them it's the Denonnie Zane. Twitter. Yeah. DHA and ANI, ZAN, as Kitchin said. The thing with him is that he's grinding it. Like he is on top of so many stories. - You can't do this with AI. You can summarize and summarizing the stories and just being very helpful and useful. I started following him maybe like two months ago. And I think he's a great follower everyone should be following him. But yeah, that's like a way, you know, he's like, "Why aren't more people tweeting about news items?" Like there's like 32 beer reporters and stuff like that that do a really good job. But he's doing that kind of work for fantasy managers and it's very, very helpful. - Yeah. So he deciphered a few things. One of them being Sharman A might be ready earlier on in the season. He tore his ACL pretty late in the season. So if he'd be ready for week one to be six and a half months in. - Yeah, I don't see it happening. - No. - I just don't see it happening. Like maybe he's Superman and he beats all the odds. But why would we necessarily bet on that that strong? I do think that just given the sentiment, you can probably be a little bit more comfortable taking him in bestball. Like I wasn't taking him that much in bestball so far. And his ADP is gonna rise. So that's an L for me. But I do think that like again, 100% healthy Sharman A, Gidarian prices ADP probably be a little bit lower. You know, he'd probably be more in like the Chuba range or the Ramon range than he is right now. And so yeah, I mean like I do think that's a pretty, pretty insane timeline for him to be back week one. I think that would be, I mean props to him if he does it, but that's, it's usually at least an eight month thing. - George Hullani, coach is still like him, especially past protection and receiving. So first back with starters, Gidarian. So the second back with starters. And then Emmanuel Wilson mainly running as the RB three with Milro. And this is why I said in our bestball chat, like Emmanuel Wilson's a really hard click for me. - The problem though, the problem though is that like George Hullani is it's similar to me, to me at least as like, I don't know, Jacksonville to a degree where Jackson was probably a bad example because Bay Shaltuton is very clearly like the early down guy with Chris Rodriguez's timeline. But like George Hullani is more than likely going to play a role with the first team no matter what. Because they use him in a pass catching capacity, right? So like Gidarian Price playing ahead of Emmanuel Wilson is not that surprising to me. I think the Emmanuel Wilson bet has been what if Sharps just out all year, you know, like what if they don't have, and it doesn't look like that's happening at this point, just based on all these reports. - Okay, this is something that we've been eyeing. We've talked about it on the show. We've had some people in the Discord also talking about it. And that's the concern with Chris Rodriguez's foot. He confirmed that he had surgery and there is some serious steam on Bay Shaltuton. - Yeah, I mean, as I've said for the last year and a half, well maybe year, all roads. - All roads lead to Bay Shaltuton. - Yes, it's become a meme in the Discord where we just say hashtag all roads. Anytime there's a favorable Bay Shaltuton report. But yeah, I mean, it sounds like this is not a minor injury where he might be back at training camp or around that time, but who knows? Foot injuries are very scary when you're talking about a running back. And then all reports are that Bay Shaltuton looks the part so far, which I'm not that surprised this time of year. There are certain players where if they're physically gifted, this is when those players look best. Like, Jaden Blues getting some positive love, right? And like, Jaden Blue is a physically gifted speedy player. You know, Denzel Boston is a size free, right? Like, I'm not surprised that he might be getting some favorable love just because he's a beast, right? From that perspective. And so, you know, I'm not shocked that Bay Shaltuton's getting love, but I don't hate it. - Yeah, for sure. - Okay, this you shouldn't hate too. You've talked about this. There's some exciting changes in Washington. We're talking about Jaden Daniels play action. We're talking about moving Terry McLoren around a little bit. Chig Tobor, lots of talk about Chigakonko being involved heavily in the passing game. And we've even have another, you know, tied into Vincent for those that still are rostering in Dynasty. - A little bit of glimmer of hope. - I've never understood the Ben Sinett stuff. It's been so weird. He was like tied in three and rookie drafts a few years ago. - But it's like, it's so strange how there's like so many truthers. And I didn't, I just didn't think he was like that great of a prospect. And it's just like, I don't know, it's been a wild journey with Ben Sinett, but I think Chig is better than him and has a lot of ups and I'd, so I've been drafting him a decent bit. You know, obviously I've been saying stuff about McLoren all off season that I like him. And then, you know, we've been, we've been hyping up David Blown, what this offense could look like. So there's just more and more evidence that, you know, things could be pretty good for Washington this year compared to what they were working with last year. - Okay, Brenna Yuke's bold strategy is going on social, threatening, is he threatening the team that is in charge of his contract? I just don't know the guy is, is he given the right advice or that he's like following the advice that he's been given? - This is why I'm becoming a basketball bro. You know, I was like, oh yeah, Stefan Diggs, when he signs, he's going to see an increase in ADP or, you know, K-Shombooty, if he gets traded, he'll see an increase in ADP. And I'm like, you can make the argument for Brandon and I, Yuke, but this is like accentuating circumstance territory where like we have no idea, right? - Right. - We have no clue what's going on. 'Cause we've seen this before with players where very talent, I think most recently is probably Johnson, where like very talented, but then just like off the field type stuff started to come and it just, he never got back on track. You know, obviously the easy example is Antonio Brown. But, you know, I'm not saying that like, that's what's going on with Yuke, but certainly his posts are kind of all over the place. You know, he's wearing Washington commander's gear in some of this stuff. Although I have no idea at this point what's real and what's not. Like this is, this is what, 'cause like, this is the perfect reason, this is the perfect downside of AI for our job in particular, is that it's not important enough for me to go fact check it, right? Because, and I like the updated headline. It's not important enough for me to go fact check it because I'm like, I don't care what Brandon, I Yuke is posting on Instagram, but I do kind of want to know, but I don't want to have to dig in and be like, is this real, is it fake? You know, it's just, it's so, like it's so- - I'm assuming it's all real, but I'm not watching two minutes of him threatening the 49ers. I'm just going off people saying, - Right. - All right, this is kind of crazy. You know, like, it doesn't, this is not, this is the part of football that I really don't like. You know, I just, I'm not, I like the drama, I like when there's like, tangible drama. Like, real like a- - Days of our lives, yeah. - Yeah, like people talking junk to one another, or like they're being like a real, you know, like, like beef between players or something like that, that's fun. That's like, like, let it play out in the field. I wanna see this happen. I wanna see Trash Talk. I wanna see all of that, right? But when it's dudes that are posting cryptic things on Instagram, I just don't care enough to be like, "Hey, is he actually wearing a commander's head or did someone just put this on his head via chat GPT?" And then you see the random pictures now of people making Ayuk overweight, you know, and like, (laughing) - Like, you can cross out, you know, and you're like, - Yeah, he posted a selfie of him in the mirror and some people took that and basically took the chat GPT and make this guy 25 pounds. - Right, right, like, yeah. And like, clearly that kind of stuff, I'm not gonna believe in face value. But like, the Washington commanders hat could go either way, right, realistically, to go either way. And I'm pretty sure it was real, but I don't wanna sit here on my show and like, have any idea that, you know, like that it's not. - Redacted who's, he was the one that had the Ayuk kidding me, a headline said he posted the commanders pics himself. Like, honestly, and this is, this is gonna sound like a plug to the Discord. I just trust the Discord and what they put out there. - Yeah, sometimes the Discord doesn't do there. You know, and then we get, we get Richard Johnson tweets, you know, in the Discord. - But we do a good job moderating those. - Oh, we do. - I mean, look, if you post a Richard Johnson tweet in Discord, you immediately get destroyed by people. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Like, come on, you know. - You're gonna regret it. All right, reporting for duty, this is the time where we're looking for those people that are in it or they're not. So Cowboys hopeful that George Pickens reports next week. That's probably the biggest reporting for duty watch that we have. - Apparently Ryan Flanoi has been, been tearing it up. I did see this. - Yeah. - He's one of those guys in Best Ball where I'm just like, I can't do it. I cannot do it. But his ADP continues to rise. - Yeah. - I mean, look, I think anything after round 14 is just like it doesn't matter. Like, they're all the same, you know, like, you don't really be so strict with ADP at that point. But yeah, like a Ryan Flanoi, I feel the same way about like him compared like an Isaac Tesla or something. - Yeah. Keishan Bouti is reporting, even Jacob Berset reporting as well. So that's those are kind of where we are on the reporting things. And then we just had some Alec Pierce news that he may not be ready for OTAs. That's that. - That's that. - This could be a big thing. That's bad because they don't have anyone outside of Josh down to wide receiver. They've Nick Westbrook, he knew. I would imagine that they can't be this dumb that they knew like they know his time time frame for return and they, you know, they haven't done anything at wide receiver. Maybe this is a sneaky step on Diggs destination, which would suck. I think it would be bad because I like the way that things are sort of setting up for the indie players at this moment. So here's, here's what I wrote that we got after the show started. This from James Boyd, who does the cult stuff with the athletic. Alak Pearce says he was given a four to six month recovery timeline when he underwent left ankle surgery in late March. No definitive timeline of when he'll be back, but is targeting some time in cancer. I'm sitting here going April, May, June. Yeah. I did all the time. I did three and a half plus six is nine and a half. Push him to the season. Yeah. That's pretty bad for a guy who has not really been an alpha in the NFL slashing college, the way that most higher volume players or hopeful higher volume players have been. So yeah, I mean, it's certainly a scary report. And this time of year, it's usually, you know, butterflies and rainbows. Right. Yeah. And this is when we look to either confirm our bias or we look just to get scared of what's coming next. All right. The only other news that we have, JJ, is that the World Cup is starting the other football. Yeah. I was in New York City this past weekend with the boys. And I was almost going to raise time to be an NYC, by the way. Oh my gosh. It was amazing to be. We went, dude, our Friday night was going to Yankee Stadium, having a few, you know, throwing a few back and then leaving early because we don't care about the outcome of the game. And it was, but it was a Yankee socks game. The red socks were in town. And then we left in the, in the eighth inning to go to Manhattan and go to a bar where it was just packed with Nick's fans. We got to watch the next game with other, you know, so like I, it's, it's like, like, those are my nicks now after, after the weekend. Yeah. That's how I feel about Freddie L.A. I was like one of his first, you know, 20,000 followers. He now has 240,000 followers. But there's a German, if you are not familiar with him, it's a, a guy from Germany that has come over to the States to talk about, or to watch the World Cup. And he's going, he's trying to get everything like Americana, like, check that box. So he went to Waffle House last night. He went to Bucky's and people are just loving it. Really? And then he's bringing the nation to do it. Look, I'm telling you, if you're European or just from another country in general and you go to Bucky's, your mind is probably just out. It's got to be like what is wrong with this country? Like this is as the opposite. It was the, it's been the absolute opposite. It was like, it's one of you. I mean, they've got fresh hot brisket on the bowl. It is. I mean, I can't even imagine Bucky's it because I've only been there in the middle of the day on road trips and stuff when it's like generally packed. Like any Bucky's you go to, it's just packed out of its mind. I can't imagine going like middle of the night and seeing it like more, I'm assuming it's more empty. I'm going to assume so. It depends on the time. I mean, I've been at 1 a.m. where it's still pretty crowded, especially like spring breakers and I mean, I just imagine what a European would think about Bucky's like that. And this is why it's mind blowing. This is why it's so awesome to see these people come into the States. He went to Jordan, hair stadium where Auburn, you know, plays their games and he was all the, I went to the to a Bucky's around there. Was he at that Bucky's? Yes. I literally went to that Bucky's. I have to think I've been to every Bucky's in the Southeast, but he saw the eagle flying around and he was like his response to like an SEC stadium. He was like, this is incredible. And one of his tweets was like me, my friend, he said, if you punch me five times, I would not think this is real. Like they're just loving it. So anyways, just a good moment. Today's data. Yeah. Today's data, pretty straightforward. I think there's a narrative out there. I'm going to be talking about this in more detail on the mail bag this week too. And then obviously I break it down a lot in the draft guide this year. But I think there's a narrative out there that running back ADP is like so dramatically different this year. And like everyone's reaching for running backs when they weren't doing that before or whatever the case may be. It's really not that different. Like there were years where we had eight running backs in the first round very frequently in like the 2018 to 2020 rain time frame. We have six this year. Like we're still drafting wide receivers early. It's not like they're, it's, you know, people are saying like should I zig when everyone's sagging? Well, what are, what is the zag going on? It's like the same thing that we've been doing for years in fantasy football. You know, maybe it's a little bit easier to draft multiple running backs early than it's been. But realistically, the market is not saying that this is that much different. Now, if you look at through 12, you know, we have a lower number of running backs compared to everything since 2014, you know, through 24 picks, it's maybe a little bit more at 12 running backs versus 11.1 historically. And then you get a little bit more, but realistically through the first four rounds of your draft, okay? We have 20 running backs being drafted. That is the same number as last year. It's the same. And it's, it's less than one running back more than like the 10 year average. So I'm throwing this data in here to basically say, let's chill out with the narrative. I think the narrative is being driven by number one, bestball and number two, bestball analysts and bros who are out there no longer just, just automatically going zero RB. Zero RB. Yeah. Or alpha RB. When other people weren't doing that anyway last year. Yeah. You know, it's, and they weren't even a lot of them. So like I think that the narrative is a little bit overblown of this like running back. Like there is a running back Renaissance from the standpoint of there's a little bit more predictability going on right now because the, the league is run heavier. And there are these like the standalone elite wide receivers that are separating them themselves because there's just giant group of wide receiver to this. The death of the wide receiver to that I podcasted about to start the offseason. But like realistically, it is not that different year over year. It's just, it's, it's not that the market's behaving in a very, very similar way that it's always behaved. I want to do at least shout that out in today's data. I mean, just bringing comments into people. That's, that's what we're doing. All right, let's get on to the main event. The late round main event. All right. These are the toughest players to rank. And let's start with the, and you at, for those that are listening on the pod, these are players that are not injured or off the field issues. Yes. Yes. Jacob's, you know, neighbors, these guys. Yeah. Obviously, those guys are the toughest to rank because we know what's going on. But I chose situations and instances where players were are just naturally tough because of new situations or competition, whatever the case may be. So we'll start with the Jags wide receivers, which everyone asked me. Literally, I get a question every single week, even though I talked about them on the show. I get a question every week about the Jags wide receivers. I want to start out with a quote from Si from, from a fellow with the last name, Manzano, who I have not followed. So apologies for that. But he works for Sports Illustrated and the quote was Travis Hunter is still viewed as a cornerstone piece offensively in a dangerous downfield threat was the, was the quote literally this week about Travis Hunter. So that tells me that he's still going to be part of the rotation in some way. You have Parker Washington, who was a 50/50 inside out player last year, similar to like the way that the, the Lions use Aminera St Brown. That was on a small sample though, because it was only the second half of the year after the Travis Hunter injury went down. He got a little bit more work and then they traded for Jacobi Myers, speaking of Jacobi Myers. He's a very solid player. You know, I don't think that he has an insane amount of upside, but he's very, very good. And then Brian Thomas had his elite rookie season and he's getting a lot of positive vibes too out of camp right now. So I think the way I'm approaching it, I don't think I know because I've drafted about 100 teams so far, but the way I'm approaching it is, I think all these guys are draftable individually and bestball and in stacks because none of them have obscenely, obscenely high 80 pieces. It's not like you're drafting Parker Washington in that crazy, great wide receiver zone, you know, in that, in that fourth round range. Brian Thomas, same exact deal. Jacobi Myers, I haven't drafted a ton of, but I, you know, he's fine where he goes. And I, I think Travis Hunter is actually in a pretty good bestball spot. I wouldn't be drafting him that much in season long, but in bestball, I think that he's not a bad click. And you can capture all this with Trevor Lawrence too if you really want to. Yeah. You know, like you can, you can just go that route and, you know, get this production via the quarterback. So I'm putting a verdict at the end of all these because I thought it would be a little bit fun because this is kind of like this, kind of like a subjective, not super animal goal. No, I love the verdict. Yeah. Of course you do. This is the most kitchen kitchen thing ever. He's going to, he's going to color it a certain color. I was going to, it's green because you, it's slightly, I am more, I am more in than out right now with the Jags wide receivers. And I, I won't, I don't think that you need to take some stand and say, I'm all in on Parker Washington. I'm all in on Brian Thomas. I think if I were to take a stand in that way, I'm more in on those guys, and I am, Dr. Coby Myers. But I, I think that given the gap in ADP, it's not terrible to still draft buyers. I was about to say the, the steam and kind of the sentiment, you know, if there's like a sentiment score on social media is lots of glowing comments about Parker Washington and then deep ball threats with Brian Thomas Jr. There's not been a ton, did Travis Hunter comments or yes, he'll, like he'll be involved. So like he'll be out there, but not seeing a ton on Jacobi Myers, which again, he was good. Like he was good last year whenever he got there and he was a big piece. There's in reason as to why that offense was was as you know, humming the way that it was on the stretch. It's why it's tough to it's why it's you know, tough to rank him. All right. Next you have Devon H. Yeah. I mean, like, I think the question I have to ask is how good is this Miami offense actually going to be? If you look at top 12 running max historically, you know, the majority of them score 10 plus touchdowns, the majority of them are seeing goal line work and he has not been the biggest goal line back historically, you know, in Miami, but it's new coaching staff. You know, he's only had five goal line rushes and two of his three seasons, like five in each of those seasons, but only five. That's not that many. The other one I think he had like 14. But so there's there's a question mark there. He had a 19.4% target share last year. I think he could get back there this year, but Malik Willis has also never hit 25 pass attempts in the game or in a game in his career. I think they're going to, I mean, obviously he's going to reach that and exceed that this year, but they're even if they're bad, they're going to be a run heavy offense. And we know that mobile quarterbacks tend to not check down quite as much as a mobile quarterbacks do. So that's also somewhat of an issue for Devon H. And I look, I've been on H. And last two years, I think he's been a target in the draft guide both years. Like he's someone that I think is very, very talented. But there's so much ambiguity with Devon H. And right now with the situation where I think in order for him to hit where he gets drafted, given who he's being drafted around, I think in order for him to hit, he's probably going to have to see a 20% target share, which could happen for sure, but I don't want to bank on that because it's a really high number for running back. So right now I'm more out than in. I haven't full faded him. I still, you know, it's just not the way that I really roll from a best ball perspective, but I do think he's probably going to be end up being more of like a 4% player for me than an 8% player. Yeah, especially with running quarterback in the Lake Willis, you know, it's, it's tough. I mean, they could be, we don't know what that often is going to look like. That's why it's tough, you know, they could be very, very dynamic on the ground, but it's not like their line is built in like a really obvious way to be like, yeah, they can, they can just sustain six yards per carry. So I just, I just think there's enough ambiguity there to just say I'm just going to go with a safer bet at running back in that range. Right. You're more out than in there. Next, you have a mecha, booga. Yeah, the biggest question with him is which version are we going to get, right? The first five games this season, he had 20 points per game. The remaining games hit 8.3 is a huge difference. Now, obviously a huge reason for that was injury related, probably Baker Mayfield injury related and that led to him ranking 113 out of 121 qualified wide receivers and catchable target rate of cordon of fantasy life data. And so you have this profile of like, there's a reason why he wasn't necessarily as good down the stretch last year, but he was so dynamic to start the year. His dynamic play to start the year was going to regress in some way because he was doing, I remember doing a 10 trends episode talking about this where like I was still in on him because even when he regressed, he probably could grow as a receiver and maybe see a little bit more work from a target share standpoint, but he was doing things unsustainably down the field to start last year. So, but even still, the Zat model really liked Ibuka coming out. I think I'm still more in than out. I'm not going to be massively, massively overweight though because I love the wide receivers in that range and he generally goes on top of those wide receivers. Like he's been in the third round very, very consistently on draft games over the last couple of weeks. Yeah, his ADP is pretty high. So you're more in than out. Yeah, but like, you know, like I, I'm probably going to have more like Luther burden this year just given costs, you know, because he goes like half a round later, almost a four round sometimes. So, I mean, he's highlights that are coming out. I think we're going to start pushing these guys up the board a little bit. I mean, look, there's like a wide open gap in the third round of bestball drafts right now where you can make the case for like 50 different guys it feels like. Yeah, but to your point, like you, you could get, if you spend that draft capital on Ibuka, you could get burned. Like there is that possibility out there. Yeah, there's nothing outside. There's, there's, for short downside. I think Tampa Bay's offense is questionable. Like, we don't know for sure that they're going to be really dynamic. And if that's the case, you can at least get a little bit of like that installation. If you, if you're getting a Luther burden type where we know the offense is going to be like, like we have a better feel about that offense when we do Tampa Bay's. All right. Next you have Travion Henderson. Yeah, guy talked about earlier for a second. The upsides clearly evident, you know, you know, you know, 147 yards and 14 carries in that breakout against Tampa Bay. And then he had 80 plus yards in his next four games. Like he was, he was cruising for a little bit there last year. And then he had that concussion in week 16. And then from the divisional round on, he didn't hit a 40% snap share. Like we saw Ramonjari Stevenson really take over that backfield, you know, in the playoffs, which to me, it's like, it's almost like if they didn't have the playoffs stuff, I think that we'd all feel better about Henderson than we do right now. And, and I also think it's disingenuous for people to do the analysis about Travion Henderson and just ignore what happened in the playoffs. Like I think that it's still the fact that like those were their biggest games of the year and they were relying on Ramonjari Stevenson, I think is telling. But from the prospect guide, I do think this is interesting in Travion Henderson's favorite. So it says, why I just have a snippet of it. It says, one clear takeaway from year one was Henderson's explosiveness. He gained 20 or more yards on over 3% of his rushes, the highest rate in the rookie class. Only 33 other running backs in the year two model database have reached that threshold on 100 plus carries as rookies of those backs who have played four years in the league. They averaged a best PPR point for game season of 14 and a half between years two and four. Okay, so that's a solid high end RB two campaign for a player that is that explosive as a rookie, which I think kind of makes sense, but it might not be this year for Travion because Ramonjari is still there and there are a lot of question marks still surrounding Henderson. So on one hand, he's explosive. He was a pretty great prospect on the other. What really changed your side from New England likely, hopefully being better offensively, because they've a J Brown and stuff now. So my verdict with Travion Henderson is pretty neutral. If you want to say that it's more negative than positive, that's fair because I do think Ramonjari is a better value right now, but I'll say neutral overall for Travion. And also the window on the screen kind of shrunk for a second there for some reason. There you go. Yeah. All right. There's been to talk about DK Metcalf and he's next on your list because people don't know what to do with this Pittsburgh offense. I have no idea what to do. I have no idea how to look at like everything logically to me says that DK Metcalf isn't a void and I am more out than in. He had a 22 and a half percent target year last year and that was in an offense that didn't have Michael Pittman, didn't have Jeremy Bernard, you know, like there's going to be more, even though the Steelers are going to be heavier this year, then what we've historically seen from Michael Carthie, I still think they're going to run a lot of 11, like at least more than what they were with Arthur Smith. So we're going to have tougher competition for DK Metcalf and he still only saw a 22 and a half percent target share last year, which isn't anything to write home about, right? He's still had a 1.83 yards per out run that's not that bad. And he's never had worse than the 20 percent target share in a season. So and then the last thing I will say, I do think that this like new coaching staff coming in both defensively, offensively, all of the above for Pittsburgh is going to be a net positive for 2026 versus where they were. Like I still don't think the market is fully like realized or thought about that. With that being said, I'm probably more out than in with DK Metcalf because I think Michael Pittman fits Rogers better. I think if Jeremy Bernard really steps up second half, we might see a dip with Pittman and Metcalf to a degree during the second half of the season from a fantasy production standpoint. I think Jalen Warren is really dynamic as a pass catcher out of the backfield. Like there's just a lot, Pat Fryermuth is probably going to be used more. Darnal Washington just signed a new deal and obviously he's a blocker first and foremost, but he can do some stuff through the air. So I'm probably more out than in with Metcalf, but he is a very difficult player for me to rank. Okay, next. Are you an RJ Harvey Hader? Yeah, my known Hader was my first, the first thing I wanted to bring up. I don't know, I've been all over the place with RJ Harvey this off season because I've talked about it before. I was out on him to start the off season, but I actually think that at this point, he's not a bad click. He's just not a great click. He was just priced to aggressively to start the off season. But last year, he was not great as a rusher. 46 out of 48 qualified running max and rushing yards over expected per rush. But as a rookie, he saw 10% target share. He was efficient enough as a receiver. They used them in the red zone pretty frequently as a receiver. It's an ambiguous backfield. I have said this last month or so on the show, but I think that the Joe and Coleman thing could hurt JK Dobbins more. It has a potential to then RJ Harvey. It could hurt RJ Harvey because Joe and Coleman can catch passes. He can pass pro. But RJ Harvey is not necessarily like, they're not going to view him as a safe receiving option who can be out there and passing down. They're viewing him as a weapon that they can get the ball to to make big plays happen as a receiver. And so I don't want to discount that when I know receiving matters so much or running max. So I'm neutral with RJ Harvey right now. It's changed based on cost and et cetera. But it's definitely a hard situation for me to rank overall. Okay. We've got the Bears Passket. and I share these sentiments. I think it's hard to kind of choose where these guys are going. - Great ecosystem, no DJ more. But then you have an elite prospect in Colson Loveland. One of the best tight ends I think that we're gonna, the Colson Loveland in my opinion is going to be part of that next. Him and Brock Bowers are gonna be part of this next like Travis Kelsey, Rob Grunkowski type, type impact in fantasy football, right? So Colson Loveland's fantastic. Luther Burton loved him as a prospect. Luther Burton did what he did as a rookie, but he didn't have the prospect profile. It wouldn't be nearly as in, but he had a great prospect profile. And then he went out and in his limited action, he was pretty good and he's getting buzz already. And there's just a lot of positive vibes around Luther Burton. Slash, there's a lot of data to suggest that this is the right kind of player that you wanna throw a dart at. I say throw a dart. I just mean like, obviously he's not a late round pick. But once you're getting into it, I think he's gonna end up going later in homeligs and he is in Best Ball and stuff. And so if you're getting Luther Burton in round five in a regular season long league, that's phenomenal. It's the perfect kind of bet to make, right? But then Roma Dunes, I still think is a pretty good pick too, especially as his ADP falls. So the obvious question here is, can all of them eat, can all of them get enough work to be relevant in fantasy football? I think there's a chance that they can, where it's not, it's a pretty concentrated offense overall. And you know, we're able to see, you know, Burton be the, the Aminra, and we're able to see Roma Dunes be the J-Mo, and we're able to see Colston Lovelin be the Sam LaPorta. You know, like I don't think that this is out of the question at all for this offense. So I'm buying in to this place offense. - This is the most in you've been on, all these players that are tough to rank. - Yeah, because I just think that the-- - This is the other ones you said mostly in, but this you're in, that's why I did. - They're tough to rank because I could see a scenario where Roma Dunes A outproduces the other two, where that Colston Lovelin just like destroys, and then the other guy's kind of underperform. Like I see that scenario play out, but I think expected value range of outcomes wise. Like I just, I like, I like these three players. Like I'm gonna be drafting them. It's like with the Jags and the Bears, it's just tough sometimes when you draft, players that are in good ecosystems, and then every week you have a decision to make. - Yeah. - Like to start them or not. That's why Bestball, it makes a lot more sense. - I think though too that sometimes a lot of times I'm approaching this kind of thing by knowing that I'm gonna have a lot of teams. And so if I'm drafting one team, I'm gonna have to make a bet on one of these guys. And I could probably tell you that that player is probably burdened, that because with Lovelin, you know, it's a onesy position, I think Tyden has some interesting late round, whatever the case may be, right? Like it's just not a position that I'm going to be more, I'm more willing to buy into wide receiver than Tyden, only because you need that Tyden to hit in a big way for him to pay off in fantasy football words. There's a little bit more leeway when the demand of the position of wide receiver is so much greater, right? And I like burden more than a dude's day. So if I'm going to pick one, if I had one team, it's probably Luther Bird, right? But the idea here is that I'm gonna have Met Multiple, right? And I, like, this is where I don't like fantasy analysis, is when people are like, you gotta choose, that's the Jacksonville thing all over again. You gotta choose which one you're in on. It's like, no, if I miss out on Luther Bird and that does not mean that I'm not drafting Roma Dunesay because I'm in on Bird, you know? I guess a ridiculous way of looking at this, because range of outcomes wise, I see a scenario where Roma Dunesay could outscore Luther Bird, you know, range of outcomes wise, I could see Colston Loveland being easily the tight end too, maybe even pushing tight end one numbers this year. Like there's those outcomes are there and to dismiss those outcomes simply because you need to have a stance on one player is one of the dumbest things that I could possibly hear from a fantasy analyst, like stop or someone who's listening to fantasy analysts. Like we don't need to be like this in fantasy football. This is a probability driven game. And as we make our choices throughout our draft, we're trying to find the best expected outcome. And so if I don't get Luther Bird and where I miss out on him or if I don't get Colston Loveland, I miss out on him, that doesn't mean that I'm like, oh, I can't draft Roma Dunesay because I like those other guys. No, that's ridiculous. Like I think we can be in on all of these guys in individual ways. - Here's some constructive criticism. This tough-to-rank section would be enhanced if they were discussing context of the current rankings and who is nearby. At least maybe the numbers in the Excel sheet would help me here. - Yeah, well you can check out the rankings on latround.com. - Here you go. - Here you go. - But we received that constructive criticism. Listen, we've got a lot of stuff going on. There's just a lot of stuff happening here. So if anyone wants to put together those ADPs that these guys are near, go for it. You'll put it in the discord and we'll share it there. - ADK is also just very unreliable right now, which is partially why. - It's all over the place because there's best ball ADP, there's like, can you really trust like redraft ADP right now? It's more like just where rankings are. Like you know, just a set of rankings and those are all over the place as well. - No. - We'll get more concrete data as it gets closer. All right, let's wrap this up. All right, we have again, so much free content out there. So much free content. So you can go to laterawn.com and subscribe to the newsletter. Obviously, you want to make sure that you're getting the episodes wherever you get your podcast. Make sure you're subscribed to the YouTube channel as well. Someone asked previously about the live streams for draftings. Yes, those are coming. This is why you need to subscribe to the channel and speak in draft kings. Again, from a code laterawned, hit up the link in the chat for your draft one, get one, the dogo, draft guide, official release date, July 10th, prospect guide. Hey, it's still out there. If you want to view it or you can become an all-access member and view it as a part of your subscription, JJ, anything you want to say to draft it so. - No, just bear with me as I get through this draft guide season because this is a beastly time. Right before we start recording, I told kitchen. I don't think I've had this much work to do in my life. Like this much on me right now. - Which if you know JJ, this is not me, you know, brown noseing, but if you know JJ, he works hard. And we know this is fancy content. He works hard, that's saying something. But this is also why I've never been more excited about a draft guide that laterawn has produced, even before when I was checking it out as just a customer. I'm more excited about this draft guide than any other draft guide in the past. So with that being said, we appreciate everyone's patience. JJ, we appreciate your hard work and we appreciate draft kings for sponsoring the show. And we'll see you next time here on the "Late Round" fantasy football show, peace. (upbeat music) This is an I Heart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.