Way Too Early Look at the 2026 Rookie Class - Dynasty Fantasy Football
65m 14s
In this Fantasy Footballers' Dynasty Podcast episode, hosts Borg and Betts discuss Thanksgiving week's packed NFL schedule and the pivotal end to the college football season. They transition to dynasty strategy, targeting rebuilding teams looking ahead to the 2026 rookie draft. The hosts characterize the upcoming class as top-heavy but not elite, advising that rookie picks will gain value as draft approaches due to typical "rookie fever." They highlight how player evaluations evolve from preseason rankings to post-combine assessments, noting that NFL decision-makers often focus late, leading to significant shifts. Using case studies, they examine Michael Wilson's recent surge with the Cardinals, suggesting a potential year-three breakout, and DK Metcalf's successful transition from a slot receiver to a dominant outside threat in Seattle. The discussion underscores that players can develop beyond initial labels, cautioning against overreliance on early typecasting in fantasy prospecting.
[music] Welcome to the Fantasy Footmuller's Dynasty Podcast with Borg Betts in the Baller. [music] Happy Thanksgiving! Today is the Baller's Dynasty Podcast, and you got Borg and Betts today. No corporate, couldn't show up. It took their Thanksgiving break early, and you know we're here for you guys. Thanksgiving Week is a really fun week in the calendar for not just, you know, obviously NFL games, we get the three games late, and then we get Black Friday, and then we get Sunday, and then we get Monday again, it's just football all the time. But in the college football landscape, Kyle, it's crunch time when we're trying to figure out, you know, college football playoff and bowl games and all that sort of stuff. So coming down to the wire here on the college season, and I'm excited about today's show because if you've been listening, a lot of our context this year, right, it's been like, if you're a contender, do this, kind of here's how we're evaluating teams and players. But if you've been sitting and waiting, and you are the rebuilding team in your league, which Kyle and I both are a diner, junior, we're buying for, you know, top three draft picks. Our season as rebuilders is coming up, right? Well, we flip the calendar to January, and we think about the rookie picks in this rookie class. Then it's time to really kind of get down to scouting these guys. So I'm excited about today's show where we actually get a first look at the names in this class, which, you know, we haven't touched on it all so far this year. We've got to do that today. Yeah, this episode is a little bit of a juk, where you're used to your Thanksgiving content, and you're going to get that on footballers main show. The Megalodon episode comes out today, which is, we'll be over two hours long. But I thought it would be a good exercise in the middle of all this before you get too deep into, you know, December, where you and I take a look at the 2026 class from a couple of different angles, okay? Because if you have rookie picks and you're rebuilding, you're excited. I also want you to pump the brakes a little bit because it is just on, on outside, would you just say it's not the most encouraging top heavy class? Well, I was going to say that I think the general consensus right now is that it is somewhat top heavy, but the top players in the class are not considered like elite elite prospects. It's kind of how it's generally being viewed. So, not that these picks aren't going to be valuable because every off season we get to January, February, and it's the best classes I've ever seen every year, no matter what. It's so funny how that happens where like in the fall, you have a general view about a class and then you get to the spring and no matter what your view was back then, do these I mean, these picks, these rookies, these guys are going to be all all be great. Of course, you know, that's how it works. But yeah, I would say in general, it's kind of largely viewed as like a somewhat weak class, but the top names, I'm able to talk about it today, I'm definitely excited for it. I just don't know that they're like elite prospects, I would say. Yes. And just hear me out, your rookie picks will gain value from here on out. For sure. So, I was in the midst of a trade right before League's deadline and I was holding somebody else's rookie pick. They really wanted it back. It's probably going to be a top three to four pick. And I said, the deal they're giving me is fine. But I know that in two months or three months, when we get to February, this pick will only gain more value based on someone either falling in love with a certain white receiver or running back prospect and just the fact that we get rookie fever. So we will kind of guide you through the process, bets and I way that we do it as we take a look right after the NFL draft. I have a list of here are the top 60 prospects, I'm using air quotes of what everybody thought right after the NFL draft for this next year. I also took an index in September right before the season started. I've done it again in November and we'll do it when we start in January, starting to look ahead. Things have changed. I was told before the season there would be five or six quarterbacks that would be first round picks this next year's draft. It's just not happening, man. It's been a bad fall for the perceived top quarterbacks in the class. Every year, there's like a late riser or two and there are some in this class. But in general, you think back to the names at the top of the list in August or after the NFL draft every year, somebody puts out a mock like the week after which is just absurd. But people do it like real NFL mocks and there's always a bunch of quarterbacks in there and they're at the top of the top 50 rankings list. Then the season plays out and whether that's right or wrong, it just changes so much. You and I were talking like last week off air about this, the NFL coaches and GMs and their front office and all that sort of stuff, they're so focused on what's happening this season for the NFL that a lot of these guys, you have some scouts that certainly are in the weeds in the fall for the college season. But a lot of these main decision makers don't actually get eyes on these guys until some of us do January, February, March. And then a lot of its reasons see bias too where it's like, okay, well, what did this player just do? What did this guy just do for me this past year? What are you doing college this past year versus like their total body of work? So that's why you see so much change, I think from the early rankings list in the summer to when you get to March and we get to NFL combines season of like, oh, here's how it actually looks like it might shake out in the NFL draft. It's just wild every year how much changes. Yeah. And it's not so much to clown on certain people or certain media members. It is literally just saying that it is a process and it's okay to say at this point in November, here's the things we think we know. Here's what we don't know. It's okay to admit, I don't know how this player is going to turn out. And then for us, the game that we play in fantasy, there's a different conversation. It's not just is this player going to be picked a certain spot in the NFL draft it. How does it translate to the NFL in in defanity? So we'll talk about that in just a second. Excited to kind of get an early take on a couple of different prospects from you. But let's make sure we rewind the film. Weekly rewind. So every single week we make sure we start the episode rewinding the film. It is a part of our process that we think colors in some lines. It's not perfect. If you're a film, bro, or film gal, congratulations, really fun. It also you sometimes look at the film and you see what you want to see out of a certain player, but you've had the pleasure of watching the film of Jerry Rice, aka Michael Wilson, who the last two weeks has decided to morph into an NFL all pro wide receiver. Dude, the stat lines are just stupid. The last two weeks, 15 targets and 18 targets. Now, of course, no Marvin Harris and junior, but I went back and I watched all those targets and like full honesty going into the last couple of weeks where it was like, okay, it marves out Michael Wilson, maybe he's like a fine double flex type play. Like you're not like excited to play it because you're not expecting him to be an alpha wide receiver one. That's how I thought about him because of what we've seen in the first two years. The NFL has been a fine like wide receiver two slash three for an NFL team, but like never a guy that you're expecting wide receiver one numbers for infanity. But these last two weeks, when you look at him and you watch him play like they are doing things for him that you would do for a true wide receiver one. Like, you look at his route tree and you kind of look at where he's running routes, his ability to not just extend the extend the field down, you know, for big plays, which he had done in the past. He's actually shown a lot of willingness and the team is shown a willingness to move him around the formation using willingness or willingness willingness to say will he know, but I was like, man, if you're using the word willingness, I would love that for a player. I did not, unfortunately. But they moved them all around and they're using them on high percentage type stuff that we always talk about in fantasy that actually matters. Like, get this guy in the slot. Get him moving on crossers, getting moving on the easy stuff, like the easy buttons that they just were never doing for more of like it's so weird that they're doing it now for Michael Wilson, but they almost never did it for more. So I don't want to over react to two games where clearly he saw an opportunity in the game scripts for, you know, Jacobi had been like literally perfect. Like they got destroyed against the Niners. Of course they're throwing the entire game. You get the Jaguar scheme this past weekend. That one goes it down to the wire and over time. It's just it all has been the perfect run out for him. But I will say with the opportunity, he's looked very good. I really like his ability to not just kind of make these tough contested catches. He's shown a really good understanding of zone coverage and how to sit down and just make life easy on his quarterback. So it's been a nice marriage between him and Jacobi. Obviously, things will change when Marb does get back on the field. But I think my takeaway from watching him play these last couple of weeks is like there is a role for Michael Wilson in this offense. What does that look like? How much is the target share moving forward? That's all uncertainty, especially with Tramock Bride. Obviously the guy there. But yeah, I mean, if you had him on your bench for the last two years, he went from like a roster clogger to like, oh, I'm actually excited to start this guy as a flex or a wider receiver, you know, two slash three, depending on Marb's availability. So credit to Michael Wilson, he has looked very good these last couple of weeks, albeit in pretty good matchups. He was an interesting pick when they took him a couple of years ago in the third round out of Stanford where you're like, okay, this was not a consensus player. One of the things we do in our prospecting is we look at what the consensus is across all the mock drafts. And when a player is usually taken, you know, a round or two ahead, we look up and we go, man, okay. We see about this players at a good thing. Traditionally it's been a bad thing when it seems reach for certain players. Isaac Tesla is one of those players this year. Where it's like, wait, no one saw him going in the third round. His rookie year, I had to go back and remember how bad it was. He had the lowest yards for outrunner gets man coverage of any player in the NFL. Like it was like dreadful. And these last two weeks, because I went back and watched some two where I was like, man, this dude is like is lining up and the other team is treating him as as if he's the wider seabour one. He's acting like he's the first treat on it and he's responding that way. So it's like it's wild to see the transformation. Like it's one thing to say year to year, like, oh, this guy's showing out in preseason and we can tell there's something different. It's weird to say, oh man, this guy's really showing out in week 11 and 12. That's when the flip switched. Yeah. It also is one of those things too that I was thinking about in looking at his kind of historical profile of year one and year two, where obviously it was pretty uninspiring. But I also feel like we're seeing some of a Renaissance for like year three. I'm not calling him like a true breakout because this is a small sample size, but year three breakout type stuff where maybe it's a conversation just on the whole for how fantasy wide receivers are viewed, whereas like, you know, in the old days, and I want one, I mean, old days, I say like five years ago, we used to always say, okay, year three breakout. That's the classic sweet spot here for wider seabour's. But because we've been so spoiled by some of these insanely good talented young wider seabour's that break out in their first year were like, dude, if you're not doing it by like the second part of your second year, like you're dead to me. That's got to help it feels as the general dynasty community approaches this. But we didn't remember not all players develop at the same rate. Some guys take longer learning curve. So I'm at least like leaving the light on of like saying, hey, Michael Wilson probably isn't what we just seen, but he's also probably a little bit better than we saw in the first couple of years where he was just running cardio out there. So where's the truth on this? I'm not sure. I'm excited to find out. But like I said, I feel like you at least have a flex play on your hands where you just had a guy sitting at the end of your bench doing nothing. Yeah. And well, obviously I have to see how they adjust with more back. The best thing is just just let Jacobi keep doing his thing. Just like I feel like it needs to be one of the top priorities across the board, like FBI, government, like make sure you protect this man and that we keep getting snaps like this is a side discussion. But you and I were also talking about like the quarterbacks that have stepped in this year and then like gotten themselves the next contract where it's you know, Daniel Jones, the big name, but it's like Mac Jones. He's those one more year, but he's like either getting like is a high end trade piece that you can trade for that teams might want. Jacobi is the same way where like I know the ballers have been talking about like what if he's their quarterback next year. So it's exciting to see because these are ancillary players. Same thing with Alec Pierce that we did not care about at all because we just knew that they were running routes and it didn't matter on the arts, brought around and target spread run. I mean, going into these two games, do you know his career targets brought run was 12 and a half percent? I did recall that actually or know that fact because on the DFS side of things, he was a guy I was like, I mean, come on. We've seen this guy in the NFL. Like we know what we're getting here and I went for the fade two weeks ago when he just went. I did the same thing. You would out and he he buried me. But yeah, it's interesting. The thing about Alec Pierce that's kind of interesting too that I was mentioning with this like year three breakout type stuff. Pierce is in year four, correct? He's due for contract. Correct. He saw signs of like, I don't know if you would just what you would describe as a true breakout for these guys, but like for Alec Pierce's standards based off the first couple of years, he broke out last year and now we're kind of finally seeing him really build on that. So yeah, just just something to think about with some of the wider viewers on your bench. Yeah. And it's I wish I would say there's something actionable. Like if your league is still as a trade deadline and you can get, let's say, would you want more than a second for him? I don't think you can get more than that. That's what I'm saying. Like I think you're kind of just at a spot where you look at him on your roster and go, all right. I have something here that's maybe flexworthy. Yeah. And that's it kind of. Okay. I looked at a player that's maybe in a different dynasty stratosphere slightly different. Yes. Yes. And I posted a clip of every single one of his receptions is here. No big deal. He's on pace for over 2000 receiving yards. Gonna break the all time record if he stays at this. He's been a top 10 fantasy wide receiver seven straight weeks and he's only accounting for 47% of Seattle's told a receiving yards like he's crushing across the board. But the discussion I want to have more so is when we look at prospects of some of the wide receivers we talk about today, including one specifically that I know you like bets. And I know that he's labeled as a slot only wide receiver. Jayson was kind of seen as that guy that he excelled in that role at Ohio State. Then he got hurt. The first years was mostly out of the slot. And I probably gave you way too many statistics that said when there's two wide receivers on the field, he doesn't do anything. Okay. He is the great example of wide receivers we've seen in the NFL last couple years were Justin Jefferson came into the NFL as he only won in the slot at LSU because that's what they asked him to do. And Jayson has kind of done the same thing. Is there any other like like if a player is just dang good, then in the NFL, we can figure out a way for this guy to win on the outside. I mean, he's leading the NFL in every receiving yard metric and is specifically outside receiving yards, which is not something he had done the first two years. Yeah. And if you're called back to like the start of the NFL season, particularly like over the off season way and we had pre-adoncy in the draft, everybody was like, Oh, it's very clear what Seattle is trying to be. They got rid of Geno. They moved on from the OC because he was throwing too much like they want to be a run team, two tight ends, but how is Jayson and Cooper Cup kind of even fit on the field together because these guys historically have been, you know, not only slot receivers, but like you think about their peaks of tar as far as what we'd seen in recent seasons, it was like, Oh, in the slot. Cooper Cup, you know, obviously is not the player used to be and there was some concerns about just like, what does this look like? But it's also a good reminder that, and this is easy to say in hindsight, but NFL teams like do have a plan and a blueprint most of the time. There are some franchisees where I'm like, do they actually know what they're doing? But they obviously saw Jayson as a true ascending like top five, top 10 type of talent at the YDRC position. And they're building their offense around him in a really unique way where like they're planning on disguising what they're going to do because they're not going to tell you, Hey, we're going to let up the three other receivers and shotgun and throw when it looks obvious, we're going to put two tight ends out there, give you a heavy look as far as personnel. We're going to play action and throw off a bit, which honestly just fits standard to perfection. So yeah, credit to this coaching staffing and to the offensive coordinator for what they're doing there. It's been great. Jayson is just unbelievable. He truly is one of those, you know, I think personally untouchables in dynasty. He's ascended to that level where he's in the top tier. The interesting thing about him too and this is again, player archetypes and like what we think about players coaching staffs don't always do rational things like what we think is irrational or you know fantasy man does think is rational and you know, Shane Waldram was just like given this guy, dinky little five yard a dot looks out of the slot and had no plans to feature him. But if you believe that to be true, then you're like, Oh, this player can't ascend to be the next great thing. So I think it's really important to like view all these guys and use all this stuff as data points and then ask yourself like, do you think players can expand beyond what they've been used at early in their own career or not? And it's hard to answer that and obviously hindsight is going to be 2020 every time. But yeah, I think typecasting certain guys into what they are, what they have been. This gets us in trouble in fantasy and J.S. and I think is the classic example of that. I am always so scared whenever I share statistics specifically like on Twitter because people will look at them and say, this is what you're saying this player will always be when often time the statistics we use are descriptive. Here's how players perform so far. So like you could have used a lot of statistics with J.S. and say he's never really been successful with two wide receivers on the field. I could have done the same thing with like Jane Reed or Josh Downs or Cleal Shakir because that's kind of been their role, right? It's like, this is what they were. But I don't think any of us question is J.S. and talent enough or do they take him at a spot 20th overall in the NFL draft where they thought this guy couldn't eventually become a one in the NFL. Like that's where we had him, you know, I know for what am I not as the teams, I took him at the 102. So that's where I had him. So I took him and I was kind of treating him as that and as that asset. But going back to the two tied in look, I know there's a lot of football guy talk here. But the other question we could have asked is how can a wide receiver be successful in two wide receiver sets? There are teams like the Steelers who it's like cratered like a cratered George Pickens because they weren't creative enough. But it also allowed certain wide receivers to earn way more targets because there's less wide receivers on the field, right? Like if there's only two wide receivers, your yards for outrun, your targets for outrun go way up and this team thought, hey, we could be successful enough for teams. Don't know are we running or we throwing with two wide receivers on the field? So credit to Seattle, credit to them seeing like, hey, we're willing to depart with the Komet calf and lock it and just pepper this dude over and over and over again. So the film has been really fun. If you want to check that out, every single JSN reception this year, that was a fun task. But yeah, I have been dynasty. I don't think I would trade him like you would have to throw me like Jamar Chase and and then we'd even have a conversation where it's like, I don't know that that person wants to trade him. No. I mean, if you got him, just hold him tight and make fun of your legmates. Yeah. Would you rather have him or Puka? Ooh. Um, man, that's tough. I think still Puka, but yeah, that's, point flip, honestly. That's not that tough a decision for me because just to, you know, waf to my own farts, Jeremy and I have both Puka and JSN in the main ballers dynasty. So we're just, you know, we're just love and lie. Yeah, why not both? That's your answer. Yeah, just, that's the answer. All right, so quick break and we'll talk about this next year's class. All right. So Betzenai are going to look at the 2026 class. And I'm going to use an asterisk there because when we get to the quarterback position, legitimately, right now we're recording right before Thanksgiving. It's like, I don't know if any of these guys are going to declare a couple of them are going to stay. We're also not going to speculate on team needs and picks at this point. So like right now, I'm looking at the top 10 and it is the Titans there at one in 10, then the giants and then we have a bunch of teams right there around two and nine, three and eight. A lot of New York, a lot of new teams, New New Orleans, New York, the Jets. The Raiders, the Brown, I mean, these are some bad teams. And then my Falcons, they're at 11, but they don't own that pick anymore, Betzenai. Well, if they can keep this respectable and the Rams can have like the 13th pick instead of like the sixth pick, maybe won't look quite as bad. The other thing that's interesting about the top 10 this year and obviously the exact order will change over the next month. But looking at kind of the top few now, like the Titans just took Camorita. They're really going to take another quarterback, probably not. The giants seem to have found their guy and Jackson Dart. Obviously, the commanders are down here because they've had just an unbelievable year with injuries. They have their guy and Jane Daniels. The Bengals are sitting here. They've got their guy and Joe Burrow. So there are some teams that are in the top 10 that aren't super quarterback needy, which I think is going to drive in the offseason. You'll hear a lot of like, oh, the Titans are shopping the first pick. You know, the giants are shopping the second pick, like that kind of stuff. Once be surprised at all to hear that just with kind of the fact that those top two teams aren't necessarily, you know, quarterback needy per se, but there's going to be some teams here that are desperate to find a quarterback in this class. And I wonder what the general consensus is going to be if that's going to be like a, these guys in a normal other class wouldn't be going top 10 type of prospects. Like I'm not there to decide yet, but I think we might hear that kind of conversation in the general media over the next couple months. I mean, how many times are going to hear about this team trading up in a mock draft? I've gotten to the point where bets and I have this mock draft database, you know, of everything that's happened in the last decade, basically. And so whenever we're talking about certain prospects, we talk about it for DFS and vetting purposes, but you know, we talk about it for rookies. It's like, these trades don't happen the way that people talk about them. It's like, it creates a lot of clicks. Don't get me wrong. I love a good mock trap. I'll read one. Oh, I mean, something won a debt. I want a day in late March or April. It doesn't, I mean, there's very few things that improve your toilet time like a mock draft in the middle of November. So it's there, but things will change. We'll find out which teams. I just know what's going to happen, bets because there will be a team that enters the final, you know, a week or two of the season. And you know, they're at the five spot. And then they had some back at like eight no conno's going to come in or Kenny Pickett's going to come in for the Raiders. And win them a game. And then all of a sudden they're going to have a worse pick just because they let some dude cook happens every year. No, no, it's funny. All right, let's talk about this. Hey, rookie. Welcome to the NFL. So there are a couple of different angles that you can take when looking at different classes. You know, you can hear about what someone says is a great quarterback class. There's a great wide receiver class, a great running back class, which is kind of what we said about this past year's group running backs, but you need to be able to understand there are different seasons in the offseason dynasty schedule for rookies. So after the NFL draft, we have a here's what the media thinks are the top players and where they're going to go. So think about last year, here's all the names. Here's even the names before the college football season that are the hottest names. Here's the players during the college football season. And then at the very end, you can also get a run like we saw from Matthew Golden last year, where he improved his draft stock from being a third round pick, fourth round pick to like this guy's going in the first round based on what he did in the college football play. So things change a lot. And then in February, March and April, we talk about the film, the stats, the NFL combined, the buzz that we're hearing. And that informs our rookie drafts. But what I just want to say is like, you don't have to pick which season is your favorite. You need to gather in information from all of these. So I don't have the time in August because that is a crazy season for us in our jobs to be able to look at every single college football game. I watch most SEC games because that's where I'm at. SEC country. Betts has the pleasure of watching whatever season Penn State just had this year. Do you guys call that a see what do you guys call that? We're already moving on Kyle this year. Betts gets to watch or you go to a lot. I mean, you went to that Oregon game, right? Yeah, my wife and I usually try to go to a couple of years. Her parents have season tickets, so we go with them. It's a great time. Super fun. Love being there. But what I'm there, I'm not watching to scout these guys. I'm just there to have a good time. Yeah, it's unlike you. I try to catch the big games in the fall. But man, with the way NFL is Thursday. And we're like two weeks away from Saturday football games by the way in the NFL because they do that thing around Christmas where they have Saturday games. But Thursday, Sunday, Monday and like everything's on repeat. For us with young kids, Saturdays are kind of like the day to not sit down on the couch all day, watch football sadly. But I'll try to catch at least one or two big games every weekend if I can. But yeah, I mean, full honestly, I don't have my head around this class or any class in general until we get to February, March. So full honestly, that's where I'm at. I would not take today's show as advice on certain prospects. That is not the goal of today's show. It's more just trying to for us as well as you guys start to get our heads around like, where is the strength of the class? Who are the names you need to know that type of stuff? Yeah. And so for me, like I watch most Georgia games because that's, you know, that's basically what people do here in the south. They watch Georgia games, watch most Alabama games. And then I'll usually pick whatever one or two other SEC games that are the big ones throughout the week. It's just we get a lot of good games. Okay. And I like very spoiled that there's just, but I have to ask about your fandom because you live in Georgia, but your sister went to Alabama. Yes. Yes. My parents paid for her to go out of state to Alabama. That's why my parents are Alabama fans. So who do you root for when they play each other? So that's, I had a moment and you know, people do fandom differently. We talk a lot about how people are laundry bros. They just follow a team blindly. I had a moment after college where I go, these guys aren't my heroes anymore. Like I'm older than these. These are kids. They're like 18 year old kids. So I would say like if my family gets together, I will watch an Alabama game and root for them. When Alabama and Georgia play, I just kind of back off and just say I want good football. But yeah, I'm at the point now where it's just like NFL is what we do. But I do, I do miss those days where it was like I'm watching every Georgia game and I'm going to those by friends. Just different. Do you go to a game every year now? I don't know. Yeah, I usually go to a couple games. Nice. Yeah, it's just a little different. But so let's talk about these classes and what I did is I went back April 30th of 2025. So that was right after the end of, I know. Okay, you can do this too if you're listening. You can set a little reminder and I have one that goes off every year a couple times a year where I just take a snapshot of who are the consensus top. Prospects. I could do this as like a freezing cold take and just dunk on every single person on the planet. But all it is is a chance to say what do people think are the top prospects? And so bets, I'm going to give you this of the 60 top prospects consensus. Okay, so not just like one mock draft. This is an average of what everybody thought right after the NFL draft. There were 19 offensive skill position players in that group in that top 60. So quarterback running back, White or C for Titan. Many people we care about in fantasy, 19 of them. When I'm looking at that group right now in late November, seven of those guys still exist in the top 60. Okay, seven of the 19 of the skill position players. What does that tell you about making prospect lists in April? They are at least a starting point. But by no means are they anything close to what the final mock drafts are going to look like in a year basically. So yeah, like I said at the start of the show too, so many of these NFL teams are evaluating the past season of what just happened, which is why there's so much shake up in the landscape of prospecting. But yeah, that's that's why you said how many and the top 60, 19 offensive skill position players and only seven of those 19 are even on this list like four months later. So most are projecting like a defensive, heavy first round. Yes. Yes. Across the board, it looks like the people that we trust and people that we use the most and when we do our prospect indexing, you know, Dan Bruegler, those type of people, it's a very defensive heavy group. And even the top names at quarterback have flipped a ton. When we talk about these quarterback prospects, we have to ask, are they going to even declare? The top quarterback prospect right after April 30th was Drew Aller, a Penn State. That is hilarious and hindsight. I mean, of course the injury doesn't help his case, but he was playing pretty terribly before that. But that's the perfect example of how much changes. Yeah. If you're in a super flex league right now, I feel confident that you might get two, maybe three names in the first round, but those are based on need. I don't even know if it's based on talent alone and how it translates to the NFL. So right now for an Inam and Dosa, who originally was at Cal and is having a dream season with Indiana is kind of consistently seen as if he goes in the NFL draft, he will probably be the most pro ready prospect. He's six five to twenty five. I wish I could use the word pro ready and say that translates to what we're doing in fantasy, but that's not the same thing. But he isn't treating and I think NFL scouts overall love the season they're seeing in front of him and some of his wider severs, including Omar Cooper, Jr. I'm interested to see how that translates to at the wider see position. But Mendoza looks like a player that you need to know about in super flex, but his scramble rate so far is just seven and a half percent. It's just me. That's fine. It's not detrimental, but it's also not a plus in his bag for fantasy. He's kind of seen as the top name tie Simpson of Alabama is another name that's up there and yet also out of nowhere for NFL scouts like he wasn't even in the top 15 quarterbacks before the season. So those two are kind of seen as the top two names, Dante more of Oregon is a sophomore who knows if he'll come out either. He's another name you need to monitor. And then my think my favorite name to talk about for fantasy is Lenora sellers out of South Carolina. He has the best scramble rate of anybody in this class is 13%. I just don't know how he's going to translate the NFL, but he's a name that I think we need to put on the radar. Yeah, for sure. And when you think about kind of, it's funny. The NFL readiness versus like game we play in fantasy is not always a one to one match. And when I think about like, oh, this guy's intriguing for fantasy, that 13% scramble rate for sellers is definitely interesting. I think a lot of the general kind of scouting community feels like he would benefit from one more year in college to like kind of develop as a passer, but seems to be like a toolsy type guy that you can talk yourself into. For context on Simpson, he didn't start like start starting games until this year. And there's always one of those prospects that pops up. I feel like every fall, then you look at the data and a lot of people have shown this over the course of time. Like players that do not start a ton of games in college, it is at least a yellow flag in terms of prospecting moving forward into the NFL. And he kind of fits that bill this year. We'll see on him. But yeah, I think in general, you've seen a bunch of names fall and a couple guys rise. And we're still not even sure on like who's declaring in this class. I thought it was funny. Dame Bruehler had a direct quote in his like most recent rankings list saying an NFL scout told the athletic quote, the Oregon Finance Department will make sure Date Moore is back. So now we have this whole new world of NIL and all that too. And it's like, Hey, if I'm you know a 20 year old kid and I can make millions in college and have the best time of my life, do I want to do that? Where I'm the guy and we're going to win a bunch of games or you know, go play for the jets or something. So I understand why these guys are sticking around an extra year. And I think we're going to see a couple of the names that we thought we're going to come out and up ultimately going back to school. Yeah, that's the hardest part of talking about quarterbacks in this class is let's say there's three or four guys. I bet two of them go back and they just said, okay, I'm going back to college. It is interesting because I used to be, I used to be on the vein to look at quarterback to say, if you're old, get out of here. Like I just don't like old quarterbacks because you want early to clear is what we want. Like at the running back position of somebody 24, 25 years old RJ Harvey, get out of here, man. I don't want you. But the quarterback position is a little different nowadays in terms of how many starts you've had and you're seeing players actually stay in school a little bit longer than what they used to because you mentioned the NIL type stuff. I'll give you one more stat with sellers because you mentioned kind of the tools, he party 6, 3, 2, 40, it's just a rare combination South Carolina has not had a good season overall. They almost upset Texas A&M and then they just farted around in the second half. That was terrible. Dude, I can't tell you like when I'm looking up and you know, my friends and I were always texting about SEC stuff. It's like, oh my gosh, they're about to they're about to upset Texas A&M and then just the rest of the game is just silent because it just slow, it was a slow death for South Carolina. But right now he has 21% of South Carolina's rushing yards, which one of the things I look at is what percentage of the team's rush yards did you have in your best season. You need to be above 15% to even make noise in the NFL. So like Josh Allen was at 18% at Wyoming Jackson Dart, who we've seen on the NFL. That was one of the things that you and I pointed out. He did this at Ole Miss. He was at 22%. The sellers is right there in that sweet spot where he's above the threshold that I care about. And if a team drafts him, you're going to draft a player that you're going to put out there that's going to have some wild outcomes. Like his range of outcomes is you're awesome for fantasy. You're really, really good to are you Justin Fields? Like that's that's kind of what we're working with there, which feels been fun for fantasy. Not so fun in the NFL. But when I look at the list of teams that these quarterbacks could go to, it's like, oh no, you're going to the jets, the Raiders or the Browns, aren't you? You don't think shoulders the guy? Why are you laughing Kyle? That's rude. Real quick. I thought should have played decent this past week credit to him. Yeah, it's the Raiders. I mean, it's the Raiders. So come on. But yeah, I think take home is like the quarterback classes for the most part, not what it was build to be a few months ago. And some of that has changed because of certain injuries and stuff like that. But just in general, it's pretty weak quarterback class, I would say. Yeah, I don't even know if Ty Simpson or like these guys aren't even going to be a part of the group. So we'll see about that. Running back is a little bit more interesting because the name before the season was Notre Dame's Jeremiah Love and the name in the exact same spot. I mean, literally I'm looking at mock drafts from, you know, September to right now to where people had him. It's like this dude's been locked in and it seems like so far from the people that we trust. He's still going to be locked in. He's six foot to 14. By the way, whenever I use measurements, these will not be the measurements that show up in February and March because everybody lies here. But Jeremiah Love is going to be the dude, right? Like I feel very confident in him locked in as the Arby one. Not just Arby one. I think, I mean, never year there's group think, right? So like, I'm not saying this is what you should think or what we're definitely going to think. But I think the general view on the class is Jeremiah Love is going to be the 1.01. And that is unlikely to change unless something happens between now and in February March. But yeah, he's certainly the best running back prospect in this class. Dynamic, catch a football, does everything that you want in fantasy. And I think when we look at not just production profile, we also consider NFL draft capital. He is getting a ton of round one buzz. Obviously, a lot's going to change between now and then. But he's the only running back that's consensus first round pick as of this recording. So he looks like a very strong prospect just kind of, you know, at a top level view. Yeah. And our initial kind of run, there seems to be a gap between here's who I would take at 1.01. And okay, here's who's in the mix for 1.02. 1.03. 1.04. So like even in a super flex draft, but we the way that we talk about a lot in footballers, especially in our ranks, especially the way that Mike ranks people in his rookie rankings is we're not just going to take a quarterback there because I need a quarterback at the spot. So I think love is one of those people, even in super flex drafts, like he's probably going to be the 1.01. And you should be very, very happy if you have the 1.01. And we'll see how the rest of your season turns out if you end up with that 1.02. 1.03 in your league. I'm in a league where I didn't mean to win, but I won this past week. Was that down on junior? Yeah. Good. I lost by 0.02. And I was so happy. That's like the, if you are trying to tank and we have rules against tanking and you do your best, but you lose, that's like the best feeling in dynasty. You know why I lost. It was like the last DAC to George Pickens play in the game this past week. And that's why I lost. So so happy. Oh, man. So beyond love, though, I think there are a lot of question marks from where things were before the season like there wasn't a consensus of saying, I think this is a first round or, but the Penn State running backs, which I know you can speak to, we're kind of seen as like the next best tier of Nicholas Singleton and K. Tron Allen. So kind of talk about where they've been. I mean, Penn State as a whole, here's the expectations before the season. And here's where it's at now and how that's affected their outlook. I mean, it's been pretty much disaster fall for everybody there. Just based off kind of preseason expectations and I mean, taking Oregon to overtime and like almost winning that game and so much has changed since then. Obviously James Franklin's gone and all that. But the shine on like the top names in this class, even Drew Aller, like you said in last April was air quotes consensus, KB one of this class just sounds so silly to say that I laugh. That I laugh. I mean, he literally has not progressed any season over the last three years. And I feel bad for him that, you know, obviously the season ending injury, but he just was not showing any signs of progress. And the same kind of like shine on these running backs. So I'm not saying these guys are bad players, they're very good players. The shine on the running backs is kind of worn off as the team has been out of the spotlight in the last six weeks or so. But I will say like both are ultra productive. They came into school together as freshmen single team was RB one in the high school class. Number one overall recruit for running backs in the country. And then KTron joined them and ever since then those two have just been, you know, the offense basically for Penn State. Every year they lack wide receiver firepower, they had Tyler Warren last year, but they really haven't had like a playmaker, a true playbanger outside of those two guys. They have been the engine of the offense through and through. And I think it's funny this past weekend and not take anything away from KTron Allen, but he did set the school rushing record. And I was watching the game broadcast or making a huge deal about it. And I kept saying to myself, I'm like, yeah, but like this guy's been here for four years. And it took almost the entire four full, I mean, they have one more game left. We'll see if they make a ball game, but it took the four four years to do it. So technically he is the leading Russian Penn State history as KTron Allen. Nick Singleton can break the all time Russian touchdown record this weekend, which is held by a sickle and bark. We did it in three seasons. So yeah, the production profile for these guys that was going to look good. They were the offense the last four years in happy Valley. I think Singleton is kind of viewed as more of the, you know, you always hear that like thunder lightning analogy for back fields like he's kind of viewed as the lightning and KTron Allen as the thunder. So let's use this in healthy. Exactly. But they have a little different play styles, but both very, very productive. And I don't know where they're going. The NFL draft. I could see third round. You know, that kind of thing, maybe. But they're on the radar is like probably early, second round late first round type rookie picks is kind of where I would say those guys are like penciling in it. Yeah, it's, it's love. And then it's we're going to have to figure out what the NFL thinks about a bunch of these guys. The other names that you need to know Michigan's Justice Haynes, who is a, from here is Georgia boy. Jonah Coleman out of Washington. And then loves teammate Jadarian Price. It is an interesting conversation there because love is seen as this, you know, first round talent. But Jadarian price has been really, really good as well. 5, 11, 209. So all of these guys like if we get day two draft capital, that's when our ears are perked up. And so what we get to do until then is kind of see how they finish out the season. Not that Penn State's going to have a postseason, but if they did, they can make the, what's like the most, you know, insulting bulging you can go to see the mud bowl from a, from water boy. I mean, I'm a picture in like what's it? You know, the dukes mayo, you know, whatever. Okay. That is the games that are played before you've even realized it's bowl season at like two o'clock in the afternoon on Tuesday. They might make one of those. Maybe I'm a purist because there is a time in my life where I think college football is my favorite other than baseball. Of course, come on, baseball. But I knew all the balls and I also had it on my calendar and I would do, you know, we'd have like picks competitions between my friends in high school. Like we'd, I loved that and I knew which bowl games to count on and I knew which teams were going to play in which bowl game, you know, let's all say big 12 versus, you know, packed in like I, I understood that. I do miss the first days. It was a simpler time. I'm not saying we got things right back then. I'm not saying we weren't dumb. We were doing lots of dumb stuff back then. But I just, that's, that's the part of college football that I felt like was a disconnect now where it's like everybody gets a bowl and I don't know what any of these bowls are even called anymore. And then half the guys that are, you know, if they got a little nang injury or they're headed for the NFL draft, they sit out anyway and yeah, it's lost its shine for sure. Yeah. All right, let's take a quick break and then we'll talk about the wide receivers. Some interesting names there. All right. So wide receivers is the bread and butter and dine. See, let's be honest. If you have a young wide receiver, I don't know like a JSN or a Puka or Michael Wilson. Come on. You're Michael Wilson, even then you are feeling really, really great about your life. I would say so far my initial read is that this is a good class, not a great class. And there are names that fit in certain schemes and I don't know what those schemes are in the NFL that they will be attached to. That's one of my hardest things when I look at wide receiver prospects. I learned this a couple years ago from Matt Harman. So you know, Matt Harman probably from Yahoo years ago, he used to write reception perception for the fantasy footballers. So it was in the ultimate draft kit. And my job was to edit those articles. And so one of the things that Matt taught me a lot is like, here's what this player played in college. Here's his role so far. Here's what he could be good in the NFL. And then if he goes to a scheme that's not utilizing those skills at all, it's like, I have no idea what this dude is going to be. So you have to kind of take all of those things and combine them together. So the first thing we got to talk about is Jordan Tyson, who was at Colorado a couple years ago. Now at Arizona State, he's dealt with an injury last year. He was a great season 75 for 1110. He lost his quarterback, Sam Levitt, who was one of my favorite prospects that I was really excited about. We'll have to wait another year on him. And he's kind of struggled versus zone this year. But man, I feel like he's so smooth and his consistent buzz the last two years, he's going to end up being in that conversation of being an easy first round wide receiver. Yeah, then he deal with injury at the end of last season two, if I'm not mistaken. So we kind of have that back to back years. I wonder how teams will will view that. But yeah, ultra productive, definitely a guy that I think isn't in the conversation as the top wide receiver in the class. So he's 6 to 200. I would say he's not explosive. He's more like fluid. And the way that I need to explain him, like I think he's a lobby where you look at a lobby place, like you just earn targets by the way that you get open on the field and you're out running abilities. So Jordan Tyson is the first name you need to know about and recent mock draft consensus. He's kind of seen as a top 10 overall prospect. I don't know if he's that like I compare and do past classes and guys that went top 10, like Ted Aroa or some of the other guys that have gone top 10 recently. But Jordan Tyson and then we have a wide receiver out of a house state that is not the wide receiver out of our house state. Jeremiah Smith, that will be the next year. But carnal Tate, if you've watched any college football, he's been around. They won the national championship this past year. 6, 3, 195. When I was going through the prospects, I think he is my quote favorite prospect. I'm not saying he's the best. He's my favorite to watch. But also I think when I watch a higher state film, I have a bias of watching every single other wide receiver that I've seen in the last decade. And if they don't come out and they're not incredible, then come on. I mean, that's what these guys do. Yeah, he it's so funny that Ohio State's so spoiled at wide receiver that every year, there's like two guys that are going to be in the pros and mostly only know the one because he gets all the headlines and that stuff. I'm like, oh, there's this other guy that's probably going to be in the first round. I felt draft too. Yeah, it's just a year after you got these guys turned out. Top share wide receiver prospects. He's really fun, man. If you watch some of his best plays, a lot of the big time catchers down the field contested, like really good body control type stuff. So he's definitely a fun upside type guy. I haven't watched a ton of his nuanced stuff to know how he wins best. When I think about just what I've seen from watching big time games and stuff like that, like at least once a game, he's making a huge play down the field. So yeah, he's really fun. I'm excited to dive in on him. He seems to be another player that's in this top 15 to 20 range right as of right now. So just keep all of this with the great assault. I think when you're looking at your rookie drafts, so we talked about Jeremiah love. I think you will have a mix of three or four wide receivers that you will feel comfortable with in that top five to six range, which is great. It's great to have that. It will kind of be on personal preference. It'll obviously be on landing spot. We'll talk about that a lot. But at the end of the day, if you're a first on wide receiver, you don't have to overthink it. And a lot of times we look at certain teams, like the example we always use is jail and water. You know, he's taken six overall and you're like, ah, but it's the dolphins. We don't know how good to it is. It's like good wide receivers and teams that draft wide receivers early usually end up figuring it out. You're starting to see that with Ted Aaron McMillan, where maybe you hated the landing spot. Maybe you didn't like Bryce Young. It's like, no, this dude earns targets. If you earn targets in college, you're probably going to earn them in the NFL. So just just think about that with some of these projects. But I think the prospect that we're most excited about or at least like I like talking about the most is McCoy lemon out of USC's 5 11 195. And when I was putting together like our list of names, I did this to myself. I said, I bet this is the name that one bets. When we talk about this will be the guy he wants to and this is like his type of dude. I mean, I just like the good wide receivers. Is that bad? No, dude, there's good wide receivers. The NFL doesn't quite understand like Teresmartial Jr. You know, good. The NFL doesn't get it. We're still waiting for that breakout. It's coming. Yeah, he kind of profiles as one of those guys that when you think about how the discussion is going to go on him in three months, there's going to be a lot of like, well, you know, the testing wasn't great. Exactly. Is he big enough to play in the perimeter like is he a slot only guy at the NFL level? Like you're going to hear a lot of that. But as we just talked about guys like JSN, obviously I'm not making that comparison with with lemon, but just the NFL figures out ways to use their most talented players. If they are that good, I don't know if he'll be that good, but like at least when I watch him and you look at some of his production and stuff, like the dude is just seems like a good football player. He's playing out the flashy. He's probably not the best receiver in the world, you know, but he will get the job done. And so he does profile as like the type of guy that I personally attached myself to where it's like, I don't know, just I like drafting the good guys and not worrying about chasing like the theoretical upside and traits type stuff. I kind of felt that way about like a book of this last year where a lot of the conversation on him was like, okay, yeah, he's like a nice floor NFL wide receiver, but like how truly great can he be for fantasy? I think we as a community, I'm not saying you and I, but just in general fantasy players, we have this like binary approach of like this guy as a floor player like a ceiling play, but anything can happen in that range of outcomes like nobody actually knows. For example, Wanda Robinson popping up for 40 points this past weekend or whatever it was with with James. It's just hard to archetype these guys. So I think he is a very good productive wide receiver who profiles well at the NFL level. Is he the flashiest? No, but I think he'll be productive. Rookie sensation wide receiver out of Ohio State, Imiqa, a big boo. Man, I I wonder how many times and maybe you could make this into whatever type of game, tricky game you want. How many times he's going to be compared to Almanra? Oh, yeah, that's a good one. I mean, that see connection to. Yeah, slot out of SC. He's not prototypical. Hopefully he doesn't like gain the Alman raw, you know, like everybody hates me and I'm going to use this against me forever. And it worked for the NFL, but personality wise, he's still still not my thing, man. Yeah, you you don't like the try hards. It's not so much he's a try hard is just that he built his entire personality around the fact that everybody doubted him on one day of his life. And now those doubts are obviously not existent. So it's funny. Well, no, no, no, to him, it's every day. Read the names. Oh, yeah, dude, he's he is looking at who did the Titans take that year? Like Des fits Patrick. Oh, good. Yeah. So it's guys like that that he's bringing up. So, um, a guy lam in his name that I think early on, I like, I hope the NFL likes him as much. And we'll see where the combine testing and all that stuff. His film against Iowa. I just rewatched it. It's really, really fun if you want to look that up. He's out Boston for Washington is a big body receiver six four two nine. He's probably going to end up being that traditional X wide receiver. I almost hate that Roman Doons a is like the comparison because it's also Washington, but like that's the role that he's playing for the exact team. So that's interesting. One of the players that I'm most interested. It's like, I have a big question mark early on. Like I have this list and I have little notes. It's just like my thoughts is Chris Bell out of Louisville. He's six two two 20. So he's kind of like a bully with the ball on his hands at a lot of times they give him these in breakers where it's just like, dude, nobody wants to tackle him in the same way. Like, Debo, nobody wants to tackle Debo when he gets a full head of steam. And my early notes are, I feel like he can be Rishi Rice, but he has worse hands. So that's a bad problem when you're Rishi Rice who's getting pepper with targets. So he's an interesting player. I wanted to bring out. Yeah. I don't have them yet, but I'm definitely intrigued by him for sure. The note that you put there about being a bully on in breakers makes me kind of feel like when you watch and play, I mean, you get him in the NFL. Do these guys have the same like tackle breaking ability over the middle of the field in the NFL if they do in college? That's the question that I have because it's like, if you can do that in college, great. But remember, when you go to the pros, every single player is faster, stronger, you know, that stuff. I don't know my violation on him, obviously, yet, but like knowing that that's kind of the preconceived idea of him, I'm excited to dive in more of like his true NFL potential as like a route runner, if that makes sense. It's interesting when you think about I use the Debo comparison at South Carolina. He was that dude and then the NFL felt like he got even more fearsome. Yeah. Like it's just like, like it's just kind of known. But then like Xavier Leguet was that dude for one year at South Carolina where it's like nobody wanted to tackle this dude. And he looked five times bigger than everyone else gets the NFL. It's like, it's not really the same yak ability. Obviously, a different player, but interesting. And then one more name, you can bring up anybody else you want is Casey Concepts you own, which I love getting that dude super fun as somebody who took French for eight years. Oh, I don't know. I'll dude middle school high school. I even took it in college. I'm not saying I was great at it. Oh, so you're not fluent. I could have a conversation. Nice. That's a fun guy. I call you and I want a German guy. What? Yeah, I don't know. Give up that. I did. You don't seem like you're into the finer things to speak French. Oh my god. Dude, come on. I consider myself a pretty educated well-read person. Well, we'll see. Okay. Well, Casey Concepts you on. He wasn't in C-State. Now at Texas A&M who has had a really fun year. If you haven't watched Texas A&M football, they've had a really magical year. He's 5/11/190 and the way that they use him, I think he will translate really well to the NFL. He's kind of slippery. He's crafty as good hands. He's also explosive. So I just, I like when I watch the film of him. I'm like, this dude's going to work in the next level, but I also know I don't want to play it my flag too soon. And maybe it's also me being able to pronounce the last name that makes me a little biased. I mean, is there anything better than when you have your rookie draft and you get to pick him and say his last name? That at least is worth a bump in the rankings. I mean, come on. Well, that's what I have to do because, you know, for the ballers, Dynasty, you have to phone in your picks. Of course. And the same way you do for the NFL. You have to, like, you know, call a number and they read off a card and everything. It's a big deal. Well, whoever's announcing this year better practice up on their pronunciations. After all, I think so my early guess is we're going to see four, maybe five wide receivers in that mix to be, you know, top, top 40 players. Yeah. I don't know if I see multiple top 10 picks though. No, I think that seems like that's definitely not the way Scouts are viewing it. I think we could see how many, how many wide receivers right now and obviously will, this will change. Like, where would you put the line at number wide receivers that go in the first round? Four and a half. Wow. I was thinking more like three and a half. That's not a huge difference. But I mean, if we get four or five, but then that makes this working class feel better than I think most people think. Yeah. So I think what we're saying is four. Yeah, probably somewhere around there. Yeah. All right. We've gone too much in the weeds of lines and figuring that stuff out. But anyway, I do, I do think there's a good mix of archetypes and there will be players who Matthew Golden and jump up in this group that we'll find out later. There's also names before the season. If you looked at like who was part of the group and it's like that dude is nowhere to be found. Nick Harbor of South Carolina is a mammoth of a man. He was the player. If you saw on the news where the text saying him, Sheriff or guy basically like caught him in the tunnel. I saw this. Yes. So that was Nick Harbor. And then before the season in Tonya Williams of Clemson was kind of seen as like a top two or three wide receiver. Clemson's had a bad season. So they're not on the list either. So it's always hard when you look at toolsy players and you see how they translate to how the NFL thinks about them. But the other side of this that you need to realize is if a team has a bad season in college football, a lot of times their players are just punished across the board. It's just like they had a bad season. It's not working out. You're not hearing about like any of these team. Yeah. Okay. Club Nick like all of these names are just off the board. So wide receivers is interesting. And then tight in as we close, there's really only one name. I mean, there's some fun names. I'm sure we'll talk about these more as we like we care about the NFL combine a lot for tight in because it tells us do their yaks skills translate. But Kenyans to Deek of Oregon is really the only name and he's been pretty consistent the whole way through six three two 45 and dude is jacked. Correct. He's really the only name. Yeah. He's the only guy getting first job buzz right now and maybe even only guy on the top 40. I would say 45 maybe we'll we'll see if that changes. Yeah, he's he's only 20 years old right now, which in March, I'll turn 21, but still like think about the prospects we like to hang our hat to right where these guys that are young highly athletic. At least we think he's highly athletic. We'll see what his testing looks like. Do those like a monster out there. So super young and productive and this past weekend they played USC, Oregon did. He went off for 672 and two if you want to catch some of his highlights there. They're pretty fun. Something type of guy that like I don't know where he will fit in the NFL as far as tight ends like the traditional inline guy or these kind of like hard birdy guys or whatever, but I mean they had him running like legit wide receiver at routes from the perimeter this past weekend. So it's intriguing for his potential upside. That creates a whole issue when we think about NFL because teams don't always view these guys as like trustworthy in that role as we've seen with you know pits and that kind of arc type, but dude is out there winning as like a legit wide receiver one. So it's he's a fun player man very very fun guy to watch. Excuse me. I feel like I've come a long way with tight ends where you know I want to look at the athletic traits. I want to look at the production. But the way that teams are using certain tight ends it's like I'm starting to understand that team really smart teams at least understand how to use an inline tight end well and not just split them out how pits wise. Sorry, maybe there's some pessimism there and just figure out a little bit slow. If you're drafting a tight end to be a slot wide receiver, you're basically drafting a really not great wide receiver. Yeah. You're exposing actually part of your game plan. That's what Seattle's been so good this year like AJ Barner. I know we talked about him a couple of weeks ago. The way that he's used is like I don't know what he's doing on this play, you know, and they draft a leisure Royo as well this past year, but like good teams. The Rams Rambe used a ton of 13 personnel and 12 personnel. It's like dude, whoever the tight ends, Colby Parkinson, who caught touchdown Davis Allen or you know, Tard Ferguson, whoever it is in the mix. It can work. So I'm interested about sedic and how teams view him. And then some of these other names like I like right now don't have any of them in the top 60. So I'm going to wait, figure that out later. But any final thoughts on just 2026 rookies as we're at right now and just how you're handling it. So like, you know, let's say you end up with the 103 or 104 right now in Dino, Jr. I think which I think I will. I'm excited about that. I don't think it's a slam dunk class for it by any means, but I think there's going to be a couple of really good players in that first round. I feel like having this conversation has made me realize the back of the first round probably is going to be decently weak. I would say it's kind of how I'm at least approaching it as of now, which is actually very helpful to know because I do have like one or two leagues that are still trade deadline is still open. And if you are a contender in those formats, of course, anything could change and you can hit on certain players in any party or you're wrecked draft. I think the general consensus is these late first or not super, super sought after or at least they won't be quite as valuable. They will be sought after because they are every year when we get to February and March, but I think if I'm a contender, having this conversation today has made me even more confident like if you need a guy to go win a title this year, I'm definitely good shipping off the one 11 or whatever in this class. Yeah. Last year, I feel like we talked about how there's a lot of players in that early second round. They have a pick there because they're all feel like they're kind of the same pick. Like, the way that I'm looking at this right now is if I have the one of seven through one, twelve, I'm like, they're all kind of the same to me. As of this recording. Yeah. I mean, maybe we'll see some players pop up where like these early second round picks, you know, they'll gain some steam because there were players there this past year is like Kim Scataboo went as the two, three, two, four and a lot of drafts like, oh, that was a great pick if you're willing to wait it out and see that. But just remember, your rookie picks, they will gain value. So the players we talked about then, summoning your league is going to fall in love with, you know, McCoy lemon because they heard about it on the podcast one time from two people, you know, or they heard about, you know, is Kenyans to be like, I need to tie it in my tight and premium league where we get three points per first down or whatever it is. They're going to be all about that. So anyway, stay with us. It's going to be a fun off season, especially when we get to January. It's and I will be going deep in the film every single route, all that stuff from all the players. So that's going to do it for this episode. If I can find the button and do my job, there it is. We will talk to you again next week after Thanksgiving. Make sure you take time with your families, acknowledge them, tell them that they're in the 11 but also ignore that and watch all the football. Thanks for listening to the fantasy footballers Dynasty podcast. If you want to take your Dynasty skills to the next level, check out the fantasyfootballers.com.
Podcast Summary
Key Points:
The podcast focuses on dynasty fantasy football, discussing Thanksgiving week's NFL schedule and the critical late-season phase of college football for playoff and bowl selections.
The hosts shift to evaluating the 2026 rookie class for rebuilding teams, noting it's perceived as top-heavy but lacking elite prospects, with draft pick values expected to rise as "rookie fever" sets in closer to the NFL draft.
They analyze player development, using examples like Michael Wilson's recent breakout and DK Metcalf's evolution from a slot receiver to an outside threat, emphasizing that prospects can exceed early typecasting and that NFL evaluations change significantly from preseason to draft season.
Summary:
In this Fantasy Footballers' Dynasty Podcast episode, hosts Borg and Betts discuss Thanksgiving week's packed NFL schedule and the pivotal end to the college football season. They transition to dynasty strategy, targeting rebuilding teams looking ahead to the 2026 rookie draft. " They highlight how player evaluations evolve from preseason rankings to post-combine assessments, noting that NFL decision-makers often focus late, leading to significant shifts.
Using case studies, they examine Michael Wilson's recent surge with the Cardinals, suggesting a potential year-three breakout, and DK Metcalf's successful transition from a slot receiver to a dominant outside threat in Seattle. The discussion underscores that players can develop beyond initial labels, cautioning against overreliance on early typecasting in fantasy prospecting.
FAQs
The podcast shifts from typical Thanksgiving content to an early look at the 2026 rookie class, especially for rebuilding teams interested in scouting and draft picks.
It is considered somewhat top-heavy but lacking elite prospects, with a perception of being a weaker class overall, though rookie picks tend to gain value as the draft approaches.
NFL decision-makers often focus on the current season initially, leading to shifts as more scouting occurs in January-March, combined with recency bias from college performances.
Michael Wilson has posted strong stats in recent weeks, with high targets and versatile usage, suggesting a potential breakout role in the Cardinals' offense, especially with Marvin Harrison Jr. absent.
It highlights that not all players develop at the same rate, noting that year-three breakouts are still possible, contrary to expectations for immediate early-career success.
Jaxon Smith-Njigba is cited as a player initially labeled a slot receiver who has excelled outside, similar to Justin Jefferson, showing that talented receivers can adapt and thrive in various roles.
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