Foreign welcome back to the fantasy football game plan.

The NFC west is loaded with storylines this year.

The 49ers are hoping Salah can fix the defense that gave up 25 points a game last year.

And they've got big questions with the health of Christian McCaffrey.

Maybe I just have those big questions and how that offense can run without him if needed.

Yeah.

Meanwhile, we got the Seahawks bringing in new offensive coordinator with Clint Kubiak and we got the Cardinals basically just running it back and having no offensive draft players drafted players at all.

And then we got the Rams trying to make it work.

We'll see if Stafford, he's back at practice, but can they actually make that work with an aging crew with Kyron and Devonte Adams?

Yeah, we'll hit all four teams and all of their Vegas lines and the fantasy names that you can count on from the NFC west before we kick this division off.

Let's go ahead and talk about some of the news that's been coming out this week.

Yeah, we got a couple of quarterbacks named the starter.

So Daniel Jones for the Colts and then we got Joe Flacco for the Browns.

How does that kind of shape your evaluations of those options on those teams?

Does it help it?

Does it hurt it?

I've seen nothing but grumbling over the Daniel Jones selection.

I don't get it.

We've talked about this and I don't understand why they're not going with Anthony Richardson other than maybe they want to let him grow a little bit.

I mean, he's 23 years old.

You got any insights?

I think separating the Colts fan from the like fantasy perspective.

From the fantasy perspective, I think it makes Josh Downs a little bit more interesting and I think it gives a little bit more consistency to Tyler Warren too, too.

As an every week option.

Also for the, for Flacco, I think it does make like David and Joku very interesting as like a sleeper tight end who's not really being drafted that highly.

Yes.

Both of these quarterback choices make it a dependable medium option for the rest of the fantasy group.

Exactly.

Doesn't make me excited, but I guess you can depend on mediocre.

Yeah, maybe.

Still not games you want to tune in for but can help your roster in a pinch.

Yeah, I guess so.

Also, yeah, last episode we went through the NFC east and we briefly mentioned Bill and I disregard them and then not a day later we found out he might be the guy it's looking like.

I mean, on the depth chart officially, he's still the third string behind Echler and Chris Rodriguez, but they have kind of told Brian Robinson Jr. To pack his bags and it doesn't seem like he's going to be playing that team.

The Commanders currently don't have their leading wide receiver or leading rusher from last year.

So it's kind of.

Kind of nebulous right now of what the Commanders are doing.

It's crazy.

Yeah.

I have no idea what's going on in this locker room because they don't think that they need Brian Robinson Jr. Or Terry McLaurin.

Yeah.

I think Bill or Jakori Crosky.

Merit.

Bill.

Yeah.

He's getting a lot of excitement over right now, but he is still a seventh round rookie.

That is still going to be a committee backfield and we still have Jaden Daniel scrambling.

I'm seeing him fly up draft boards right now.

Some people are really reaching for him.

I personally am fine taking him if he slides back and I have a draft where no one's really jumping on him and maybe I can get them later in like the 12th or 13th and get some high upside, but I think he's being overblown right now still, personally, just for what that role is.

So who's in the market for running back?

Where could Brian Robinson Jr. End up down in Texas?

Seems like the best two options, either for the Cowboys or the Texans.

Mixon's injury is still scary.

The fact that we really aren't hearing anything and it's maybe he'll be ready for the season, but Nick Chuck Chubb's being treated like the starter and Nick Chubb is older and he's had some significant injuries.

They could bring him in.

I can't imagine the asking price for Brian Robinson is too high.

And then the Cowboys.

He's got to be an upgrade over Javante Williams in his current form.

Exactly.

And you can just never have too many running backs, it seems.

Especially talented running backs.

With his experience, they can't be paying him much.

I just don't understand why they're not going to keep him for this year.

There's got to be more to this story and more going on in that locker room than anyone knows.

Yeah.

Especially with how quick everything occurred.

It'll be interesting once we get the full story.

Yeah.

All right.

We won't go back into the whole Colts fan situation and how we're going to have to deal with Daniel Jones, but that'll make me grumble.

No, let's move on to some positive NFC West.

This is a fun division to talk about.

It is a fun division.

It didn't end that fun last year.

But one of the things that makes this division probably going to have a few more on in the win column is they get to play the entire AFC South.

All these teams play the entire AFC south team.

So they might just rack up four wins against the AFC south for each team here.

We don't have a whole lot going on that's positive in the AFC south other than I'd say Jacksonville, maybe the Texans.

All right, so let's kick it off with the 49ers.

49ers line is 10 and a half.

They finished last year at 6 and 11.

We're expecting this team makes a pretty good bounce from last year.

How do you feel about that?

Ten and a half?

Yeah, they've been alternating every other year of either being a contender or being seriously hurt.

And last year they lost a lot of their key contributors.

I mean CMC was the main storyline.

But then you also had IUK almost gone for the entire season.

Debo got pneumonia, Ricky Piersol was shot.

They lost their left tackle Trent Williams and they had some like defensive injuries too.

So that's kind of why I think they can bounce back.

And especially they have the easiest projected strength to schedule.

I am pretty bullish on this team.

I think they can hit that over.

I think they can hit this over as well.

Not only did they have all of those injuries that made this a disaster of who are we going to put on the field last year, but six of their 11 losses were by less than a touchdown.

So if you can convert those six and then make the other games a little bit closer, you're well over your ten and a half wins.

They brought back Robert Sala as their defensive coordinator and I'm sure he's.

I don't know if he's glad to be back, but he was the jets head coach and that whole disaster show.

So I expect the defense to be improved.

It was very good under Salah before he left and went to the jets.

And we saw how the jets defense, how much worse it got in the second half of the season once he was fired.

I think he was incorrectly blamed for a lot of the other problems on that team.

So I think he will improve the defensive side and lead to some consistency.

I do too.

And that's really the only coaching change here.

Let's just before we jump into their personnel, let's talk about the elephant in the room and that's Christian McCaffrey's health.

How do you feeling about McCaffrey are you drafting him?

I have been drafting him around cost.

I've been mixing him in just because his upside, when we go into week one, he's probably going to be projected as the number one or number two running back right there with Saquon.

If he's fully healthy, we know Shanahan's going to use him.

Even when he got back the first week, even though he missed the first 10 weeks, like Shanahan gave him the entire workload, even though he had bilateral Achilles tendinitis.

So you're not envisioning any kind of share situation where they wise up a little bit and go, maybe we ought to save him for when we really need him and we should use some of our other running backs a little bit more?

I don't know.

That's just not how Shanahan's ever operated.

It is.

You are going to do everything and we are going to ride it until the wheels fall off kind of system.

So I think he is going to get that workload.

I'm not convinced of it.

I'm also not convinced he's healthy.

I keep looking for videos and other than the July 18th one where they wanted to show us specifically that he was running, I haven't been able to find anything.

I'm not really sure what's going on back here.

And we know that they love to keep secrets.

We found that out last year.

One thing I wanted to point out on just how effective CMC is, Winnie, is there is I was comparing their 2023 personnel data versus 2024, and when they were in 11 personnel, which is their most common package, their EPA per rush in 2023 was about.02.

So every time they ran the ball, it was expected they were adding.02 points to their team.

This year it was negative 0.01.

So just having CMC, okay.

Yeah.

In 2024.2.

Not it was 0.2.

Yeah.

So that's.

Yeah.

Almost a quarter of a point swing on every rush attempt for just having CMC in the game.

Wow.

Yeah.

That's crazy.

I still don't think he can do it, but let's.

Okay, so we've broke open the personnel.

Let's talk about the personnel.

Let's do the one minute review of what this means.

So personnel, we're talking the first number is always the amount of running backs and the second number is always the amount of tight ends.

The most common package is 11 personnel.

We see that consistent with the 49ers, they're a little under league average.

They Bring in a fullback.

You know Kyle Juszczyk is about one of the only commonly named fullbacks in the NFL and that is shown in the data of about a third of their plays.

They're bringing a second running back or that fullback position in and really it just shows that how much of an outlet because not only was the rush improved from having cmc, but the pass was also improved just having that outlet.

This team likes to spread the ball and have CMC be that outlet for Purdy.

So I think it will help as long as they can get consistent play.

That's going to be key, the consistent play and not being hurt all the time.

Let's talk about a couple more injuries on this team.

Brandon Aiyuk towards ACL last year and now it's looking like he's going to miss about a third of the season.

They're targeting a week's six comeback but it could push even later than that.

Juwan Jennings holding out, holding out, calf strain, whichever you want to call it.

He'd like a new contract and he's hurt so he's missing time.

Debo's gone.

Kittle is always banged up, but he hangs in there and plays anyway.

And then I guess we're down to Ricky Parasol.

Are you drafting Piersall?

I Ricky Pearsall is one of my highest drafted players right now.

He is one I'm most excited for and I think there's a lot of value just because people don't really think of him as a breakout candidate for what he produced last year.

But just as a quick reminder, he just had a brief flash at the end of last season.

He was wide receiver 8 and wide receiver 14 in the last two weeks of the regular season.

But it took him a while to ramp up.

Not only was he a rookie, but he also got shot in the chest.

So he got shot in the chest last off season, had to work back in and then was playing football at the end of the year and did actually produce.

And I think especially with young, talented first round wide receivers, I want to buy that flash.

And he has such a golden opportunity with all of these injuries.

He's the only one at practice.

That's their day in and day out.

With Purdy getting these reps. Yeah.

That they had last year, they did bring in quite a bit of new talent to this team.

So two running backs, two wide receivers and a quarterback were drafted by this team.

Any interest there?

I think the top draft prospect was Jordan James.

Running back Jordan James, but he is recovering from a broken Finger.

Isaiah Girondo returned to practice this week and we think he's going to be the backup but Jordan James has a chance there.

Yeah, Jordan James, he was fun prospect but I think Garendo's still locked in the back out backfield as the backup right now, but especially because he had that broken finger so he's not even there.

This is a crucial time for rookies to be integrated into that offense.

But we see Shanahan first off these running backs.

If you go five deep, they're all ganged up behind cmc.

He's the only one like listed healthy on their depth chart which is weird.

So we might see some of these rookies thrown in.

I feel like we're.

They're 49ers are notorious for just bringing guys off the street and they produce in this system.

So Jordan James especially is a fun like waiver wire name.

As we get deep into the season.

Is Shanahan picking up the phone calling Washington right now going probably Christian McCaffrey is the healthiest one we've got.

Maybe we ought to get somebody else.

Yeah.

So let's go through your target share chart.

I do have.

I am bullish on Pearsall.

I think he is going to be the number one option for this team and we just see so much consistent value from first round wide receivers.

A lot of people didn't think he was a first round talent last year but this team was all in on him and I think given a healthy off season, given that chemistry and we saw his potential last year, if he was able to do it in those bad conditions last year and still be a top 12 wide receiver on some weeks then I think he could do it a lot more consistent basis.

And then George Kittle just has his role cut out.

I think he is a great option, especially you're not having to spend a second or third round pick like you are with McBride or Bowers.

He's a little deeper in the draft, especially for his role.

Yeah, I can go with all that.

What happens if McCaffrey isn't playing?

Are you still on the over?

I think they'll find ways to do it.

I like the defense a lot better and I really like Purdy too.

I think this passing game is going to be a little bit more exciting.

The one like free agent we didn't Talk about was DeMarcus Robinson is coming over from the Rams and he's just another contributor.

Like he is going to help Purdy.

He's going to help stabilize this offense and help them produce on a consistent basis even if CMC isn't here.

Hopefully they will.

When with McCaffrey out, he came in, he left again.

And then Garendo getting hurt last year and all of the injuries in week 16 of last year.

Brock Purdy was their lead rusher for the game with 26 yards.

They can't have games like that.

They've got to have somebody that can actually run the ball.

Besides Brock Purdy.

That was a game to Miami too.

But in the off season right now everyone's looking good.

We'll see if Juwan Jennings signs.

He's kind of deserves more money for his role.

They're going to ask of him, especially with IUK missing time.

I don't think.

I haven't been taking IUK anywhere.

Have you?

I haven't either.

No.

I've largely been staying away from this team.

Jennings is going too high for me and Ricky Parasol usually disappears as well.

There, there must be a lot of players right in that range that I like because I never end up with them.

All right, shall we move on to the Seattle Seahawks?

Airline is eight and a half last year they were.

They did have 10 wins but they did not make the playoffs.

They tied for the lead in their this division but lost on the tiebreaker.

This team feels really new.

It's all new players other than their running back room and jsn.

Yeah, we don't really see a lot of double digit win teams just blow it up like the Seahawks did.

They have a new play caller, they have a new quarterback, they have a new wide receiver.

One.

Yes.

This is total change.

Yeah.

Their new offensive coordinator, Clint Kubiak came in from the New Orleans Saints.

He was previously the past game coordinator in San Francisco and his brother's still in San Francisco.

Clay Kubiak.

So Kubiak's or well known coaching family.

Any concern with Clint Kubiak or shall we jump into what personnel he liked in New Orleans?

I feel like New Orleans might be a little bit of a bad example because they also had their giant share of injuries last year with losing their quarterback.

All of their wide receivers.

The only thing that was healthy was Kamara.

Yeah.

And we did see some amazing weeks from Kamara and he was really integral in that offense.

And Kubiak, his entire scheme is based on running the ball.

We saw Mike McDaniel, Mike McDonald, the head coach for this team, wearing a hat last season saying run the damn ball.

And then he brings in Clint Kubiak.

They're telling you what they want to do.

They and yeah, diving into their personnel like we can see from the Saints, they're bringing in a lot of these exotic packages, 12, 13, 21, a lot more than the league average.

And it's all to create this kind of dynamic run scheme where you really never know where you're going to get hit from.

And if you're a defensive lineman, whether you're taking the right angle or if there's a guard pulling that's about to get a cheap shot on you.

And we saw how good Kamara looked in it, and even just getting quick outlet passes for the quarterback.

And when I was diving in, I had some hesitations about Sam Darnold and everything.

I don't really.

I'm not fully bought in on Sam Darnold.

I think it was a lot of the Vikings making him look good, but I think for what they're going to ask of him, he can absolutely execute it and he has the experience.

They're not going to ask as much as the Vikings did last year.

This is not going to be a spread, air it out offense.

This is going to be execute the play action and hit the kind of open man that we've schemed up.

So are you drafting a lot of Ken Walker and Zach Charbonnet?

Yeah.

Which one?

Yeah, I've been kind of mixing them in, so I want pieces of this running game and I'm willing to take both.

We've seen Zach Charbonnet in a week that Ken Walker was out, was the number one overall running back on one of those weeks.

So he has that ceiling if Ken Walker is to get hurt.

And Ken Walker has missed a lot of games in his seasons, so I've just been mixing them in and I think we'll actually get spike weeks from both of them throughout the season.

Yeah, I think so.

And it's interesting.

I've been asked a lot about handcuffing and the theory behind it in fangirl football with the ladies, and we don't do a lot of handcuffing anymore where you truly need that other back that's behind you.

This situation.

I would lean differently if I'm taking Ken Walker.

I almost definitely want to guarantee that I've got Charbonnet sitting there as well.

Potentially my attack.

I've done it a couple times with the Seahawks, but I think I'm more looking for the handcuff where, you know, I take CMC and then grindo's a far or far lower price.

The problem with handcuffing in this situation is Charbonnet is One of the most expensive backup backups.

He's being drafted as the RB35.

So you are.

He's going slightly earlier than most backs.

Is that because we think Walker's going to get hurt?

Probably.

And people want this running game.

Yeah, they do.

They want part of this running game.

Let's go ahead and look at your target share and see what that's going to look like.

Jackson, Smith, Najigba, jsn, He's the guy now with Metcalf going to the Steelers.

He is the guy.

No DK anymore.

Dk, he had kind of already overtaken him, but he was still basically facing the number two cornerback typically and DK was still lined up against the main corner for each team in man to man situations.

So JSN is going to be asked.

They did bring in Cooper cup as that veteran role.

I think he still has some production left in him similar to what we saw of Adam Thielen the past couple of years for the Panthers.

That role, that slot receiver, route runner.

Cooper cup was never a physical dominator like he had some get breakaway speed, but that's not his skill set.

This is one of the target shares.

I've adjusted more throughout this off season because Tori Horton, the fifth round wide receiver out of Colorado State has just come out of nowhere and right now he's a starting wide receiver on this depth chart and he has been getting all the camp buzz so he is starting to climb up draft boards.

He is starting to get drafted more often in best ball leagues and he is making some splash plays especially in the preseason game.

So have you taken any Tory Horton yet?

I have not, no.

I think Tori Horton might be one of those that were going.

Yeah, we bought way too much into preseason play.

Yeah.

The one thing I can think for Torrey Horton is that outside wide receiver for Clint Kubiak.

If we think that's the Rasheed Shahid role that New Orleans had, we saw what that offense can look like when it's working in those first like three weeks for the Saints and I think they'll set up some plays to try to beat them deep.

They want to hammer you on the run game and then set up that play action deep.

So I think he could appear in some daily fantasy lineups.

All right, Talking about daily fantasy, where's Jake Bobo?

Yeah, he's kind of.

He's.

I've done well with him in daily fantasy in the past and he's not anywhere on this chart.

So is he just gone?

He's.

When we look at Marquez Valdez scantling.

I feel like Bobo's better than him.

I. Yeah, I would say they're about the same.

Marquez Valdez scaling has just bounced around as an ex wide receiver for all of these teams.

He was with Kubiak last year for the Saints and the problem is JSN and Cooper cup both prefer to play in the slot.

So you're already.

Every time you have to bring Cooper cup into the game, you're forcing JSN to the outside.

And then if you have a third wide receiver for you're not having a third wide receiver all the time.

I don't really think these third options are going to be consistent at all.

And I think Tori Horton has apparently just shown out, so I'm buying in on the Horton hype train right now.

All right, you can buy in on that.

Clint Kubiak loves his tight ends.

They got a rookie tight end.

How do you feel about him?

Yeah, they've talked him up a lot in the passing game.

He is not a good blocker really.

So when he's on the field he's going to be used as a pass catcher.

But I don't think he's going to be on the field that much because this team's identity is running the ball.

A trade off.

Very interested to see if he's part of those red zone packages, but I have not been taking a lot of Elijah Royo.

Typically rookie tight ends are not the best bet.

I think he'll.

He might take a year or two.

What's he going to do without a Taysum Hill?

It's true he might have been a remnant from the Sean Payton scheme.

So we'll see.

This is true.

All right.

Over under the eight and a half.

I don't know if you.

If we picked before, let's do it again.

I like the over for this team.

I think they're going to have one of the better defenses in the league and I like the running back room even.

We didn't really talk much about the depth behind Charbonnet, but they brought in Damian Martinez in the seventh round who I think is a very talented third option too.

This is just a great entire running back room and they're going to establish their identity.

I think a lot of these defensive physical identity teams have a clear path to that nine win mark but not a lot of ceiling to get those like 14 or 15 win outcomes.

I feel like there's too much in motion on this team and that they're going to have to take a step back and find some Consistency.

They've got too many people that have never played with each other to have a successful season.

For me, even if you are running the ball.

Cause then everyone knows you're going to run the ball and that doesn't end well.

Yep.

So I'm on the under for the Seahawks 49ers play at Seattle week one.

So one of these two teams is going to start off with a losing record.

Let's move on to the Cardinals.

Talk about two teams that are very different.

The Cardinals didn't change hardly anything from last year.

So their line is eight and a half and they finished last season eight and nine.

The coaching didn't change, the team didn't change.

They're going to have the continuity that I'm looking for in deciding if a team's going to be successful.

I'm going to be on their over eight and a half here where I was on the under for the Seahawks for exactly the same reason.

Because they get another season to do to learn what they did well and to do it even better.

We had Marvin Harrison Jr. Last year as a rookie coming in where we all thought he was going to go crazy, but it's taking him some time to learn.

And Kyler Murray feel like he had a really good year, but he needs even another year to come back from his injury.

How are you feeling about this team?

So I do like the Cardinals and Jonathan Gannon, their head coach, has shown consistent improvement through his first couple years.

And I think this team is playing a lot harder than a lot of people expected.

Last year they did not really have high expectations.

I think they only finished with a wins.

But still, this team was in a lot of those games coming down to the wire and the defense didn't have a lot of talent.

But I think for the players they had, they were executing at a really high level.

So I do like this coaching.

I'm not as high on them for fantasy options, but I like them as a team and I think they're going to be a fun team to bet on.

Okay, so let's go into the plays that they like to run.

They shouldn't be changing.

It should be more of the same.

Yeah, pretty consistently.

But one of the weirdest things, when I was going through their personnel, I was like, this is if you covered the team logo and the team name over there, I'm like, this is the Steelers.

Like they're bringing in all of these 12 and 13, bringing in these extra tight ends on the field to basically just run it down.

This other team's throat.

We can see that when they have in 12 personnel, they're in that about 30% of the time and they're running 60% of the time.

And then they're in 13 another 15% of their plays and running 70% of the time on those packages.

They want to have James Conner.

They want to challenge the opposing team to try to tackle James Conner 25 times a game and see how they feel the next day.

I think it'll be fun.

I don't think a lot's going to change here.

And for those other tight end options, they really just have McBride as the only passing option.

The other tight ends they bring are just blockers.

Yes.

So that we just all agreed that nothing is going to change.

They're going to run the same kind of thing.

They're going to run and they're going to use their tight end.

So why aren't you taking James Connor or Trey McBride?

I like McBride.

He's just a very steep cost, but I've taken him a little bit higher than the average rate.

I really like him.

And Bowers, if I can get one of those elite options for tight end.

I think like James Conner.

Yeah, I think he's a bargain.

He is if he stays healthy.

He just worries me with how much wear and tear for that physical style like he before last season that was about his only like healthy full season.

And I have been taking a lot of Trey Benson because I want pieces of this rushing game just not around that spot that James Connor goes.

So you're willing to take CMC but not James Conner because you think CMC is going to stay healthy, but you think James Conner isn't.

James Connor's younger and has less of an injury pass than CMC.

I'm.

And James Conner is going at running back 18.

He finished last year as running back 11.

And this whole team seemed to be scared of the end zone last year and couldn't actually get into it.

We can talk about Trey McCarthy Bride's lack of touchdowns here in a minute when we get to the the target shares.

But even James Conner wasn't necessarily getting a lot of touchdowns either.

He had eight rushing and one passing.

So I think he can definitely step up and get into the end zone more than he was last year.

It's not really fair to him.

And really the only knock I have against him is that he was healthy last year and he's just such a bruiser of a runner and he absorbs that contact.

I think of like Jameer Gibbs or something where they're just really good at never really taking that full hit or they're very deliberate.

If they're going to lower their shoulder, it's probably against a smaller cornerback or something.

But James Conner is like meeting those linebackers in the hole and he wants to fight for that extra yard every time.

So I like Trey Benson as a backup just at his price.

I think he's a similar bet and he has significant upside in this rushing attack.

Yeah, didn't I hear all of that last year too?

And that didn't work out real well for Trey Benson.

He didn't really see the field.

But you're going with healthy last year means injured this year, little bit.

All right, let's move on to target share.

And who else is there Besides, Marvin Harrison Jr. And Trey McBride?

And does Marvin Harrison Jr.

Figure out how to run his routes and get in the right spot this year?

As far as relevant options, I think you can cut the list off after those two.

Michael Wilson's gonna play the wide receiver two role.

I just don't think it's gonna be worth that much in this offense.

I think Harrison will be better, but I think I don't really like him in fantasy because I think a lot of the upside is already being taken away.

Last year he was.

He finished as the wide receiver 30 and currently in drafts he's going as the wide receiver 14.

So even if he does improve, like it's already projected in where you're taking him, you're taking him above other like elite options.

You're taking them around like T. Higgins and everything and like receivers that have shown they can produce more than him.

So I don't know.

I was taking them a little bit early, but I've slowed down recently.

What about you?

I haven't been taking him, but I like James Conner in this offense.

So we'll see if that comes back to.

To haunt me because I have been taking Connor and I haven't really been on the Marvin Harrison Jr.

Bandwagon, but I could probably get there.

I think you're right though.

He's going a little bit higher than I want right now.

I need somebody that's shown what they can do, which it's the opposite for me and James Conner, I feel like he's going lower.

He is going lower than where he finished last year and I'm willing to buy into that run game.

Yeah, for Harrison to really be a value at where he's going, like it would.

He would need to be double digit touchdowns.

He would need to take A significant leap into that dominant tier one.

But if everything comes back to normal, then this whole team's going to be scoring all the touchdowns that they didn't score last year.

It's true.

So are you thinking that translates ten over an eight and a half for the Cardinals?

Yeah, I'm on the over for the Cardinals.

How about you?

I also the over.

I like this coaching staff.

I like the scheme.

Um, I do like James Conner, this rushing attack.

So I am on the over for.

All these teams though.

How does that work out?

We still have a fourth quarter.

It's all about to come crashing down.

Yeah.

Let's move on to the Los Angeles Rams.

Their line's nine and a half, I guess cuz they won the division last year at 10 and 7.

But that seems a little high given the whole situation.

I don't know.

This just feels like an ancient team.

They swapped in Devonte Adams for Cooper cup, but that's about all the changes that they made.

Everyone just got another year older.

Yeah.

And they didn't have a lot of room to give there too.

It feels like this team is just one play away from having their season entirely change.

And we've had seasons like this in the past.

In 2022, Stafford missed a bunch of games and that team missed the playoffs and only had about six wins.

So I think that's one of the like outcomes here is that we just see a repeat of that 2022 season.

Yeah, I think so.

Stafford's health is a huge concern.

He did actually make it to practice this week, but he has an aggravated disc and that doesn't sound like something that is going to just go away.

It's not going to go away.

So they've definitely got to protect him and otherwise we're looking at Jimmy Garoppolo.

Yeah.

And I think if we get Jimmy Garoppolo, then Devonte Adams might just leave and go out that door with Stafford.

Because we already saw Devonte force himself off of a team because he did not want to play with Jimmy Garoppolo anymore.

It could be interesting.

Maybe we'll see him become a Steeler or something.

All right, what's this team like to run?

And they're probably going to keep running it because it all runs through Kyron Williams the running back, doesn't it?

Yeah.

Sean McVay has a scheme and that is a spread attack.

They use 11 personnel where they have three wide receivers about 81% of the time.

It's like them and the Falcons, who their offensive coordinator also Came from the Rams that always use three wide receivers, but they don't actually pass that much.

Even though they have all these wide receivers, they more just want to force the secondary on the sides of the field and kind of create more running lanes for Kyren in the middle and especially in the red zone.

They heavily lean on their run game and we saw just Kyren eat once they get down to the red zone.

Yeah, I have not bought into Kyron Williams.

I thought he was terribly inefficient last year and doesn't have too many yards per carry, but he keeps getting it done and he keeps getting the ball in the red zone.

Like you said, he just got paid too.

Yeah, that usually ends up in an injury when they pay him.

But we've also seen how quickly things have turned, especially for the Rams.

We had Todd Gurley leading the league in touchdowns one year and then cut the next and irrelevant.

This team just doesn't make me excited.

It should.

I love Devonte Adams and he had a really good year last year, but I don't know, I just feel like Stafford's not going to play this whole season.

That's kind of where I'm at.

If you're having to take an epidural a couple weeks before the season, how are you going to back up or bounce back from taking hit after hit?

And I don't think this is one of the better lines in the league and so we'll see.

I don't think they have a lot of depth either.

So we've seen Stafford consistently tough it out and grind it out in games, but at some point it's got to catch up to you.

He is one of the oldest quarterbacks in the league right now and he has taken a beating through his career.

So at one point you just takes a little bit longer to bounce back from those hits.

Yeah, definitely.

So assuming that there is somebody in there capable of passing and I don't know that there will be with Jimmy Garoppolo, what's the target share going to look like?

We've got Puka Nukua and Devonte Adams and then everybody else.

It feels like.

Yeah.

And even if we see Jimmy Garoppolo, Puka and Devonte play a very quarterback friendly system, I think they're still, they still have a solid floor, especially in PPR leagues.

I'm not letting them slide too far in drafts.

But Puka also struggles with his own injury history and he misses games from time to time and he is involved so much.

That kind of takes a beating.

But I like Puka and Devonte.

I was taking them earlier in the off season.

I've just been scared off with all the Stafford news.

I've been scared off as well and just trying to stay away from this team.

I don't get excited over this team.

I feel like I'd rather be involved in a team that I am excited over even if I have to take like Marvin Harrison Jr.

I feel like that situation's just a little bit better than this one.

So for the top three options, we have Puka going drafted as wide receiver 6.

We have Kyron drafted as RB13 and we have Devonte Adams drafted as wide receiver 16.

I feel like those can't all work.

And this it's not like this was a high flying offense last year.

They were 20th in scoring so they're being drafted really high.

If you had to rate them in confidence, like what would you say out of those three for just not ruining your team?

Like not I'd probably go devonte Adams first.

I feel like he has been the most reliable even though he's 32.

I feel like he's usually the healthiest and he finds ways to get open.

Puka scares me because he's so young and he's still so injured.

You're also passing down like Malik Neighbors and Brian Thomas Jr. To take him.

And then to me this feels like the situation we saw last year with the jets where we were all buying into the jets, receivers, running backs, you name it.

But then we were very down on Aaron Rodgers and in the in a similar situation I'm like, how can you love the entire offense without loving Matthew Stafford?

Yeah, and I don't think there's any way that I can get everyone to buy into Matthew Stafford.

Matthew Stafford can't produce two top 15 wide receivers and a running back and not do well himself.

So something's got to give in this situation.

I'm personally just trying to stay away from it.

Me too.

So I am taking the under for the Rams.

It was part of the reason why I like the Cardinals on their over for their division win total because they play them a couple times in the back half of the year.

Yeah, I'm on the under here too.

They do also get to play the AFC south so that will benefit them, but otherwise I'm on the under.

How do you think this division finishes?

What's your order?

Real quick.

Oh, hard to go against 49ers but I 49ers are Cardinals win it, Seahawks are third and the Rams are last I'm with you.

I think the Cardinals give the 49ers a run for the division, but I'm just going to take Shanahan and Purdy to eke it out.

And then Seahawks and I think the Rams probably are set up for a collapse and maybe a six or seven win season.

I think so too.

I guess the Cardinals, I keep putting them in there because of their touchdown deficit last year and I feel like at some point they got to get lucky and if all their luck comes in this year, then they're going to win this division.

Well, that is it for our NFC west breakdown.

We've got one last division.

We'll be tackling the NFC north next.

There's a lot of question marks, but of a lot of fantasy value if we know where to look.

Yeah, so make sure you hit the subscribe button so you don't miss the next episode on the NFC North.

And if you missed any of our previous breakdowns, go back and check those out as well.

Anyone out there looking for women only fantasy leagues?

Check out fangirlfootball.com and we'll see you on the next episode.

Sam.