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Time now for Fantasy Football Weekly from iHeart Radio, your weekly source for the nation's best fantasy football advice, speculation, and whatever stupid stuff they decided to drop into the show. Now, here's your host, Paul Archi.
Hey everybody, welcome to another micro edition of Fantasy Football Weekly. I am Paul Charchi and co host his usual Tyler Cannabily. On Twitter at no, I changed my Twitter name. Oh you're dead?
I did.
I demande. It's something easy.
It's something easier now.
But I've gotten so good at singing the kN A B.
Yeah. Well now it's you can still look that up. I'm pretty sure you still find me. It's a PPR Tyler now just pp R Tyler. I can't believe that name was still that PPR Tyler. I like it.
It winks per.
It's really come into my fantasy points per rash, my career fantasy.
That's uh. I like that points per rash. Let's let's run that.
Uh.
Today, we're gonna break down James Connor.
He just won't go away. The player won't go He wants a couple I thought when he went to the cards like he's done after this year, We're not gonna talk about anymore, right, And he's not. Only are we still talking about him, he's still producing, still producing. He was the RB nineteen last season, he was the RB ten and average points per game and he's going off the board is RB twenty seven the exact same story. It was like.
Nobody wants him.
Yeah, you know, he's not.
A highlight guy.
He's just a grinder, right yeah, And the definition of a grinder he is.
And so you know, you don't get these explosive plays, you don't get red zone alerts, you know, you just he's just a guy in a bad offense. And yet at the end of the day.
He gets it done. He does. I mean, after Kyler got hurt last season, he I mean, he just did what he did this season before. It was one hundred and forty against New England. And these are all good like running defenses for the most part.
After Kyler got hurt. So this is like the final whatever six seven games this season.
Against New England. One hundred fourteen yards in the touchdown against Denver, one hundred two yards in a touchdown against Tampa Bay, one hundred and twenty yards in the touchdown, and then against Atlanta one hundred and twenty eight yards no touchdown, But he was the RB four in that span.
Wow, all right, James Connor, this guy quietly powering teams. Him and Jerick McKinnon powering teams through the fantasy playoffs.
Another stat I like too, He hasn't caught less than thirty four passes since his rookie season where he had a zero and he had like two games.
Yeah, we don't think of him as a PPR helper, but he is.
But he is. And who's gonna take touches away from Connor? Like you think you thought, maybe, oh, Cardinal's gonna draft a running back maybe like round three, round four, Like they're definitely a candidate to do so. And right now, here's the depth chart. Keyonta Ingram no threat, Corey Clement no threat, and Tyson Williams who got cut when he was like the one, JK. Dobbins and Gus Edward J c Elsa.
You remember that.
Yeah, what a time.
So that guy's not going to be a factor. All right, So it's James Connor's job. We know they're going to use him prodigiously in Arizona. It's a bad team. They're going to be losing a lot of games, so we'll have to be worried a little bit about it's halftime and they're down by seventeen, So are the Cardinals going to be running a lot in the second half of games? But at the end of the day, we care a lot about opportunity, and He's and James Connor's gonna run the ball a lot.
Yeah, and they might not even if they're down like twenty at half time. He might still be on the field just catching more passes. Anyway. If he's on the field, I mean it's first down, they're gonna throw, oh both swing pass at the James Connor for three yards. Yeah.
In such a deep running back draft, I really thought the Cardinals would put a fourth rounder fifth runner. Now, they had need everywhere, so I get it, But I would have thought they'd have put a mid rounder on the running back position and got themselves a little more help. Instead, they didn't go that way. I love the fact that
they did put a first rounder into the offensive line. Finally, addressing offensive line, they have a whole new coaching staff, including a new offensive coordinator, Drew Petzig, who had some time here in Minnesota but also with Cleveland. Then with those two offenses had in especially when he was in Minnesota and when he was in Cleveland powerful lead backs Nick Chubb, Dalvin Cook in those offenses.
Yeah, I mean it's a it's kind of a great thing. You like to see that he spent I mean, I think his his most recent job was a quarterbacks coach in Cleveland, So I mean you kind of get the sense that hopefully he learned something from what's his flank, the fancy Yeah, and hopefully he can kind of bring that scheme over to Arizona. I mean, it's it's a new coaching staff than we've seen. I mean, obviously James Connor was with Kingsbury for a while, so we'll see
how the this new offense will look. But it's like I said, we're gonna take.
This was a deeper this was a deeper depth chart in Arizona. Yes, I'd be more worried about James Connor, but I'm not. Kante Ingram and Corey Clement and Tyson Williams not factors.
Not worried about those, And it's not like you're even drafting him anywhere close to his ceiling. He's going as an RB three right now, RB twenty seven, Like, that's an R three.
This guy's a Guillotine League gold mine. Oh, by the way, Guillotine League's open at Gayotine leagues dot com. It's official right now. This is exactly the kind of guy that you want because James Connor just gives you a safe floor every week. And of course in the Guillotine League, all we're trying to do is not finish last, so you want that's such a great spot for James Connor, and especially if in Guillotine Leagues he continues going at his average draft position of RB twenty seven, that's a
gift in that format. In particular, let's talk about Kyler Murray because Murray obviously siphons off a lot of running, but he's also a better passer. This team's gonna start Colt McCoy in all probability for some part of the season. What do you think the Kyler Murray factor is and how does it affect James Connor well when.
He's there, I like, at least for the season, especially how much is he gonna run? Like, is he really gonna trust that knee again kind of coming out of Like I mean, I don't know when we're going to see him. I'd say maybe like midway through the season. I saw something on Twitter though, was like Joe Burrow tores ACL started the next the season like week one RG three.
Yeah, so I mean, like I think RG three shouldn't have but.
Yeah, he definitely shouldn't. He said that too, like he tweeted that out. But I mean, I don't know, but I feel like they're not gonna run as much like I think. I mean, especially when Joe Burrow came back from that season, Yeah, later he run at all. And now last year he looks like, I don't know, it looks like he can, looks like Danny Dimes can move a little bit.
So Murray when even when Murray comes back, he doesn't run much because it's he's off of fresh ACL. And here's the thing about Murray that I think is widely under misunderstood by the fantasy community at large. Dude's never been a goal line runner. They don't run him inside the five, and that's just not his bit. He's not
Jalen Hurts, he's not Josh Allen. They don't use him that way, his rushing touchdowns come from distance unless except for a handful of games like James Connor hasn't been there and then out of necessity they've run a couple of times. But Condler Murray is he could be sitting on like a two rushing touchdown season. I don't think Murray takes really anything away from James Connor.
You're You're totally right. I've had Kyler Murray on Dynasty's in the past couple of years. So when I'm watching red zone and it's at the one yard line and Kyler Murray's under center, I'm like, they're not gonna sneak this because he's he's five nine, rightee, No sneak this. You know what they do? They give the James Connor, or at least under the Kingsbury offense, it'd be like one yard line shotgun James Connor offset, which is a horrible.
Playing design, by the way, shot like this shotgun. The one is so stupid.
You don't like the threat of the past.
The one.
I get a Kirk Cousins back there, for sure. That's more fantasy points.
Everybody thinks of James Connor and you think of injury I think that's one of the very first things that come to mind, not just the cancer, but it feels like he's a guy who has missed a lot of time. But I think that's largely a misconception.
Yeah, he had thirteen games played in twenty twenty, I mean, not bad for a running back, and yeah he missed a couple, but not bad thirteen games in twenty twenty one, and he had fifteen games played last season, and he's only getting older from maybe the like it's maybe it's one of those things where like the McCaffrey, it's everyone
thought always injury prone, Saquon always injury prone. James Connor kind of was the same way, where he's injury prone for two seasons, but he's played the better half of three seasons here in a row. So I mean, we'll see.
James Connors not particularly good. He's not a special runner. His PFF ranking was forty eighth. He's not even the highest ranked Connor by Pro Football Focus. Snoop Connor had a higher PFF rating than James Connor did.
Well, let's factor in some attempts for that though, Connor get like three carries, not.
As many as i'd have given him. I'll tell you that much. He ranked twenty fifth in efficiency by Next Gen Stats, and he ranked thirty first in rushing yards over expectation by Next Gen Stats. James Condors not special, but this is all about opportunity and it's all about how you get used, including inside the five, which we've alluded to in two years with Arizona. These are Kingsbury offenses. Still twenty seven rushes from inside the five. We always
talk about on carries inside the five. Your great goal linebacks, you're Ezekiel Elliott's, you're Derrick Henry's. They convert half of their carries inside the five to touchdowns on twenty seven rushes from inside the five, James Connor fourteen touchdowns.
There you go.
That's above at is one more than fifty n me up, yep. So we're fans of where we you know, we're we're fans of where James Connor is going in ADP. Let's talk it through who's going around him, because I think we're gonna like James Connor better than a lot of these guys.
First one we got is Rashad White at RB twenty five.
Tampa could have the worst offense in the NFL, maybe even worse than the Cardinals.
It's possible he could. He could kind of be like a smaller version of James Connor though, where he has a receiving upside. He flies some power last year in London.
So I think i'd go I'd go white for the PPR.
Yeah that's fair. Uh, this is tough. I'll go white. I like his college mixtape. Alexander Madison RB twenty six.
There's still way too much weird stuff happening with the Vikings, including the very real threat that Dalvin Cook's gonna stay a Viking.
Yeah, it went from he's cut and he's gonna go somewhere else to now like he's gonna take a pa Cup because he can't get any more money.
Nobody's gonna pay him anything. So yeah, I think he's I think Dalvin Cook's people have started to realize there's no market and if the Vikings cut him, he's gonna get X amount of dollars as a cut player, which isn't very much, and he's better off just sticking. So I'm out on Madison next.
David Montgomery RB twenty eight. Guy we loves talking about a micro a couple of weeks back.
Yeah, we did, but he's in a split backfield. James Conner owns this backfield. I'm taking James Conner over David Montgomery.
I'm gonna go David Montgomery because I think the offense cancels it out for me where that could be. I think I think it outweighs the opportunity and the I think the offense could better. He's gonna have more touches, Okay, Javonte Williams RB twenty nine some like he's actually at OTA's running routes. I know it's really nothing. But when Sean Payton said he's having to go on the pub for training camp, like what's going on here? You have one of the words and the injuries of like, I know.
I'm nervous this thing. It's I'm nervous. It feels like JK. Dobbins last year.
Yeah.
Remember Dobbins was doing all this work through the summer and everything, and he participated in training camp and like, oh, he's better. Sometimes it's not. You don't want to be the first guy.
Yeah. Schefter was like he won't be back for week one and then Dobbin's like, yes, I will. He wasn't.
That's right, exactly exactly, all right.
Last one we got James Cook at RB thirty.
Yeah, I'm taking James Conner. Yeah, I'll take the number. I'll take the lead, you know, the lead back.
I will not have any James Cook this year.
Yeah. There's a lot of momentum for James Cook out there, and you and I are about the only naysayers out there.
I don't know why there is. I mean, we talked about him and he had nice efficiency stats.
But no, look, it's not that he's not a good player.
It's yeah, it's just the offense that he's in, right, He's not even like the third rushing option. It's it goes probably Damien Harris, Josh Allen, then James Cook.
That may very well be true. Thank you for listening to this edition of Fantasy for Micro Edition. We've got another one coming up tomorrow. Then we've got the full edition coming up on Friday. Talk to you soon, everybody. Bye bye,