Ask Keyser - 2017 Fantasy Questions Thread

[SoS]

2 hours ago, Soggust said:

Keeper league - 

Pick 2 of 3 

Lamar Miller - 8th Round

Todd Gurley - 5th Round

Isaiah Crowell - 14th Round

That's tough. Lamar Miller is the obvious keep (though maybe he shouldn't be). I'd personally have a hard time dropping Gurley for Crowell, but the margin is razor thin. I typically side with talent when it's close, and Gurley blows Crowell out of the water. 

[SoS]

11 hours ago, The LBC said:

Worth noting, with Zeke formally appealing and looking willing to take this appeal to Brady-level (i.e. he won't serve the suspension until the repeal process is fully resolved), where are you setting your risk/reward threshold for willingness to draft him (early/mid/late what round), given that he may not actually serve that suspension until next year?

The fact the NFL brought in Harold Henderson to hear Zeke's appeal scares me a bit, but I still hold confidence that Zeke will drag this out to the point where he won't be serving time until next season. Personally, if I can get Zeke in the 2nd round, I'm not hesitating. If I'm at the end of the 1st round and I don't like my options at RB and would prefer to wait on WR due to the depth at that position, I'm not against taking him there. Just know you'll have to reach a bit for Darren McFadden later in the draft, but that's a small price to pay for a guy who is going to be a locked-and-loaded top 3 RB when he's on the field. 

[SoS]

14 hours ago, mattyice0401 said:

What are your thoughts on Wendell Smallwood? Is he a legit fantasy option now?

Depends what you mean by legit. He's arguably draftable at this point. I'm certainly not tabbing him as a sleeper with all of the mouths that Philly offense has to feed. He, Pumphrey, and Sproles really squander one another's value. 

[SoS]

1 hour ago, Bianconero said:

God, I really hate my 11th pick

I have never taken a WR with my first pick in 10 years, but I don't really think I have a choice unless Freeman or Gordon drops, but that won't happen in my league

I've decided on taking Michael Thomas at 11 and either Jordy Nelson / Rob Gronkowski / AJ Green at 14 (whoever is there)

I'm not touching Howard, Ajayi, Fournette, Gurley or Murray. They scream bust to me.

Of the names you mention, I'd be least worried about Howard and Murray. The Bears OLine is really good and Howard is a true bellcow style back. I see your reservations though, because it's a lot of the same stuff we heard out of the pro-Gurley camp this time last year. I like Murray because you know he's going to be a RB1 every time he's on the field, but his durability concerns do worry me. With that said, Derrick Henry is a cheap-ish handcuff and probably gives you a legit RB2 in that offense if Murray were to go down. 

If you're looking for a RB at 11, might I suggest considering Zeke? 

[Bianconero]

9 minutes ago, SoS said:

Of the names you mention, I'd be least worried about Howard and Murray. The Bears OLine is really good and Howard is a true bellcow style back. I see your reservations though, because it's a lot of the same stuff we heard out of the pro-Gurley camp this time last year. I like Murray because you know he's going to be a RB1 every time he's on the field, but his durability concerns do worry me. With that said, Derrick Henry is a cheap-ish handcuff and probably gives you a legit RB2 in that offense if Murray were to go down. 

If you're looking for a RB at 11, might I suggest considering Zeke? 

I guess I'll start with the easy one: I am definitely worried about Murray, lol

His amazing season was really just ~ half of the season because he fell off a cliff in the final 6 games

Which feeds into my next point: the guy has had a life-time of carries in just the last four years alone and let's not forget about his injury history. Add that to the fact that Derrick Henry is uber-talented and the Titans clearly love him. In training camp alone, you see Henry mixing him with the first team alone.

I could be wrong and Murray could come out on fire again, but I'm not willing to bet on that. Best case scenario, he's still losing ~ 50% of his carries to Henry the end of the season.

I would say that Howard I am the least worried about from that list simply because I feel like he is a question mark; I'm sure the same people hyping up Howard hyped up Langford as well (on a smaller scale). At the end of the day, I think it's almost impossible to project Bears players.

Quote

Jordan Howard struggled with just 3.36 yards per carry against eight-plus defenders in the box. He also faced a stacked front on 26.4 percent of his non-red zone carries. Howard produced most of his big runs out of the shotgun (7.1 yards per carry) and the pistol (6.9 yards per carry). While this might be nothing to sound the alarm over, it's a footnote to consider as he heads into 2017 after a shockingly dominant rookie season that will certainly earn him more defensive attention.

I'm not taking the chance on this + the Bears are awful. You are also betting on him completely learning how to catch.

With that said, the Bears were a bad team last year too, but Jordan Howard repeating, which he very well might, is not something that I personally want to bet on

 

[SoS]

Well, this doesn't exactly defeat the point that he has durability concerns, but let's not forget that Murray was playing the second half of the season with a torn plantar plate in his foot which he ended up not needing surgery to correct this offseason. 

I also want to mention that during those 6 weeks that he "fell of a cliff" Murray posted 92 rushing yards against the Broncos stout defense and 89 rushing yards against the Chiefs stout defense (141 total yards). I think the Titans took a lot of pressure off of him after the foot injury, but Mularkey has continued to say that Murray is the feature back for 2017. 

[holt_bruce81]

^^Uh no, DeMarco had a very good last 6 weeks of the season. In weeks 10-16 in standard league....

week 10: 29.6
week 11: 13.9
week 12: 8.4
week 13: Bye week
week 14: 15.2
week 15: 14.1
week 16: 6 

On a 232 point pace. Good enough to be a top 3 rb last year in fantasy. 

[holt_bruce81]

Is anyone taking any of these rookie RBs not named Fournette? Mixon, McCaffrey, Dalvin or one of the late round fliers like Kamara or Hunt? I like a few of those guys but I can't believe how early there being drafted. 

[SoS]

6 minutes ago, holt_bruce81 said:

Is anyone taking any of these rookie RBs not named Fournette? Mixon, McCaffrey, Dalvin or one of the late round fliers like Kamara or Hunt? I like a few of those guys but I can't believe how early there being drafted. 

The draft capital to acquire Fournette and McCaffrey are too rich for my blood. According to ESPN, both Mixon and Cook are falling right around RB20 range, which I'm totally comfortable with for both guys. I feel like I'm falling in love with Mixon more every day and I don't feel bad about it. I was also told to curtail my affinity for Zeke last year (had him ranked ahead of Gurley) and that turned out pretty well for me. 

Only reason I'm taking Hunt that high is if I drafted Spencer Ware. Kamara is very interesting in PPR leagues. Don't love him outside of that. 

[Bianconero]

26 minutes ago, holt_bruce81 said:

^^Uh no, DeMarco had a very good last 6 weeks of the season. In weeks 10-16 in standard league....

week 10: 29.6
week 11: 13.9
week 12: 8.4
week 13: Bye week
week 14: 15.2
week 15: 14.1
week 16: 6 

On a 232 point pace. Good enough to be a top 3 rb last year in fantasy. 

Seems like a tale of two different scoring systems

[holt_bruce81]

SoS maybe you can answer this better than anyone...Do you think you could draft CJ Prosise in say, the 10th round, and be given the same production as a Christian McCaffrey who's been going in the 3rd? When he came back from injury, he produced at a very high rate last year. But do you see 40-60 catches, and 150+ carries from him? He's the most talented back in that backfield no?

[smetana34]

2 hours ago, SoS said:

That's tough. Lamar Miller is the obvious keep (though maybe he shouldn't be). I'd personally have a hard time dropping Gurley for Crowell, but the margin is razor thin. I typically side with talent when it's close, and Gurley blows Crowell out of the water. 

Does he? Let's not forget that Crowell was the nations #1 back coming out of high school and had some great games for Georgia as a true freshmen before getting kicked off campus. Don't let the 2nd rate school fool you, the kid can play, and his offensive line just got a whole lot better with the return of Biotoni and additions of Zeitler and Tretter to go with All-Pro Joe Thomas. Meanwhile St. Louis has done next to nothing to help Gurley and Goff is terrible. Crowell all day for me straight up, the vast difference in picks makes it a no-brainer for me

[SoS]

28 minutes ago, smetana34 said:

Does he? Let's not forget that Crowell was the nations #1 back coming out of high school and had some great games for Georgia as a true freshmen before getting kicked off campus. Don't let the 2nd rate school fool you, the kid can play, and his offensive line just got a whole lot better with the return of Biotoni and additions of Zeitler and Tretter to go with All-Pro Joe Thomas. Meanwhile St. Louis has done next to nothing to help Gurley and Goff is terrible. Crowell all day for me straight up, the vast difference in picks makes it a no-brainer for me

To start -- oops -- I ignored the part where picks came into play. 

Second, ya I feel pretty good about that. Crowell had one of the lowest Yards After Contact averages and Elusive ratings (how many guys you make miss) of any back in the league last year. He is a product of his offensive line, but to your point they have a great one. Knowing the draft capital that comes into play, I'd probably side with you on Crowell just because I did say the margin was already razor thin. I'm personally expecting a bounce back season from Gurley with McVay and Watkins in town, because he did more with less his rookie season. 

[SoS]

1 hour ago, holt_bruce81 said:

SoS maybe you can answer this better than anyone...Do you think you could draft CJ Prosise in say, the 10th round, and be given the same production as a Christian McCaffrey who's been going in the 3rd? When he came back from injury, he produced at a very high rate last year. But do you see 40-60 catches, and 150+ carries from him? He's the most talented back in that backfield no?

Good question. Kid is a beast. The only problem is that the Seattle running platoon scares me in general. 

As a pure runner, I'd actually say Thomas Rawls is probably the most gifted of the group. Barring health, I expect him to lead the team in carries. If Lacy is healthy, he's probably taking on only slightly fewer carries than Rawls. That potentially leaves very little for Prosise, though I expect him to be a big factor in the passing game this year. 

The pro is that one of Rawls or Lacy is almost sure to miss games this year, maybe even both at the same time, so Prosise is in a good spot for a higher volume than what's currently being predicted. The con is that if both guys stay healthy, he's going to be a boom or bust weekly option with little TD upside. 

I don't think he'll match McCaffrey's production because the Panthers will truly manufacture touches for him, but if you're asking me who's a better value, there's no question it's Prosise. 

[HTTRDynasty]

I think some people are way too high on Pryor.  He's going super early in a lot of the mocks I've done, and I just read @bianconero's post saying Pryor would cement himself in the same tier as Brown and Beckham next year.  That's just not going to happen IMO.  People forget that Kirk has plenty of other good weapons around him: Reed, Crowder, Doctson, and Thompson.  Cousins has never been the type of QB to force feed the ball to one player as Eli has done with OBJ or Ben has done with Brown.  Gruden has also been adamant that he wants to run the ball more this year, which is why he told Fat Rob he needed to slim down this offseason.  I love Pryor's upside this year, and I think he will cement himself as a top 10 #1 WR in the league, but I don't think it will be reflected in his stats.  It will be reflected much more-so on film, which will disappoint a lot of fantasy football players that reached for him early.

On another note, I don't know why people are so high on McVay giving a huge boost to Gurley.  For one, McVay has never shown he can stay disciplined and committed to the run game when it's not working early.  Second, McVay didn't even design the run plays for the Redskins - Bill Callahan did.  Third, McVay can't suddenly transport the Redskins OL to the Rams.  Williams, Scherff, and Moses were the biggest reasons for the run game working when it did, which honestly wasn't all that often.  As we saw in the Rams' first preseason game, that OL was whiffing on blocks all over the place, and Gurley was getting hit in the backfield (I believe this even happened on his first carry).  I just don't think McVay will be the savior to that Rams' rushing attack that people are expecting.