🔮 A Star RB's Uncertain Future

Do you think RBs who threaten to hold out have a group chat??

In today’s Fantasy Life Newsletter presented by the NEW Betting Life:

Saquon Barkley and the New York Giants are in a stalemate.

Here are the details in their most simple form:

• Barkley wants a long-term deal.

• The Giants applied a $10.1 million franchise tag to Barkley for the 2023 season

• Barkley has refused to sign the tag and appears to have no interest in doing so.

• The NFL deadline for franchise-tagged players to agree to a long-term deal is Monday, July 17 at 4 pm ET.

If a new deal isn’t reached by then, Barkley will have only two options available:

1. Play next season under the franchise tag

2. Hold out

We’ve seen this scenario play out many times with frustrated players, specifically RBs, who want more money. Unfortunately, they have very little leverage in these situations (just ask Dalvin Cook), and the posturing is mostly done to save face.

The situation is further complicated by the fact that Barkley reportedly rejected a long-term deal worth between $12 and $13 million earlier this offseason, although the amount of guaranteed money in the offer was never made public.

It seems unthinkable that Barkley would actually sit out for the entire year. There is simply no way he is not collecting his $10,091,000–which puts him in the Top 10 for highest-paid RBs on the year.

The most likely scenario is Barkley sits out during the start of training camp and quietly returns with his tail between his legs at some point in the preseason.

He’s currently going off the board in the middle of the second round of Underdog drafts, although I have seen him slip to the 2-3 turn recently:

I had been fading him for most of the offseason–I like the other backs who go after him just as much, if not more (Tony Pollard, Rhamondre Stevenson, Josh Jacobs, Breece Hall, Derrick Henry)–but I will grab a few shares over the coming weeks if we get a discount.

These situations often amount to nothing and present awesome buying opportunities—I’m old enough to remember when Austin Ekeler was a mid-second-round pick because people thought he might get traded.

Take advantage of them.

🚨 ICYMI: Two Huge Free Agent Signings

Dalvin Cook and DeAndre Hopkins weren't the only coveted FAs on the market...

🥁 Introducing Matthew Freedman and Matt McCuen, the new backbone of Betting Life.

With years of experience, these two data-oriented betting analysts will be providing Fantasy (BETTING) Life with the same high-powered content you've grown accustomed to, all for FREE, already including:

• Team-by-team betting previews

• Divisional betting breakdowns

• FREE multi-sport betting picks in Discord

and much, much more to come.

Buckle up, Fantasy Life faithful. The Betting Life content has only just begun.

🗽 The 2023 Hard Knocks team has been revealed. This is going to be good.

💸 DeAndre Hopkins' new team decided? The betting markets are moving.

😡 Don’t poke the Patrick Mahomes bear. It won’t end well.

🐶 TWO Puppies just dropped on Underdog?! No shame if you draft in both.

🤓 Are the Cowboys going to have a different identity? Interesting hires.

🍊 The Bucs’ creamsicle uniforms are elite. What a vibe.

🐅 Will The Lombardi Trophy end up in the jungle? There’s certainly a path…

🎢 The Commanders’ QB history has been a…rollercoaster.

🏆️ The Most Accurate Fantasy Ranker. Shout out to our very own, Waz.

Our guy Ian Hartitz likes a good deal, which is why today he’s finding traits we like to draft in fantasy football at discounted prices. Take it away, Ian…

Don’t get it twisted: I’m not saying NEVER to draft any of the listed expensive picks – stacks and the reality that every draft is different can make every player a value at the right ADP.

Still, in a perfect world, I would rather have the cheaper options listed due to the vast difference in total cost.

🏃‍♂️ Franchise QBs in a talented offense with the ability to provide a decent rushing floor

• Expensive picks: 

  • Chargers QB Justin Herbert (QB7, pick 54.6 ADP)

  • Jaguars QB Trevor Lawrence (QB8, pick 66.6)

• Arbitrage pick: 

  • Seahawks QB Geno Smith (QB15, pick 114.4)

Maybe this comparison already sounds ridiculous to you, a scholar.

But hear me out…

Take a quick look at the fantasy production from each in 2022:

• Smith: 17.9 fantasy points per game (QB9)

• Lawrence: 17.4 (QB11)

• Herbert: 16.4 (QB15)

The common knock on Smith seems to be the reality that he faded a bit down the stretch.

Of course, that discussion always seems to conveniently leave out the fact that he faced a rather brutal five-game schedule featuring the 49ers (x2), Chiefs (in Arrowhead), Jets (consensus top-tier pass defense) and Rams (worst of the group, but always seem to play the Seahawks tough).

Ultimately, it’s much easier to believe that 2022 was more of a sign of things to come than a fluke when you consider the Seahawks have surrounded themselves with one of the league’s best groups of pass-catchers.

This WR trio should be inside anybody’s top-five, while there are also playmakers at RB and TE – Smith doesn’t need to be a hero in order for the league’s reigning ninth-ranked scoring offense to boom once again.

I’d certainly bet more on Herbert and Lawrence out-performing Smith for the next five seasons but for just 2023? It’s close – and that is not reflected by the four-plus round difference in ADP.

This still seems to be a result of the Seahawks being rumored offseason players in the QB trade and NFL Draft market…but nothing ever came to fruition!

Seattle can get out of Smith’s three-year, $75 million contract easily enough after this season if they want; just realize for 2023 the reigning top-10 fantasy signal-caller is buried in a tier of far less mobile pocket passers in offenses with fewer high-powered skill-position weapons.

Not bad for a guy usually going off the board after the top-36 RBs, top-54 WRs and top-10 TEs.

Rain or shine, the games must go on. This week, Chris Allen breaks down what we know about windy NFL conditions and what it means for fantasy football. Part 1 was yesterday, here is Part 2…

Let’s do a quick recap with two key takeaways from Part 1:

• League averages in passing yards per attempt fall as windspeed increases, but it doesn’t mean the same for fantasy output

• Metrics that matter for fantasy (like pass rate over expectation and total plays run), hold steady up until 20 mph

🌪 Today’s Goal:

• Explain how wind affects each QB differently and why high winds impact the most accurate and efficient QBs with rushing upside less.

Fantasy managers use multiple sources to draw their conclusions. Weather effects shouldn’t be any different. In fact, because of the small sample sizes, a push for more variables to pivot on should be anyone’s starting point. To better understand if wind causes any impacts, I used PROE, CPOE, and total plays to see which passers become problematic against the wind.

The result was a list of 28 different quarterbacks. From Josh Allen to Jake Luton, each had played at least one game in conditions with 20-mph winds or worse. But instead of trying to tackle the group as a whole, I split the group of 28 QBs into three buckets:

• Aided by Weather: PROE, CPOE, and Plays Run were either positive or negligibly off (+/- 3 percentage points) from their baseline

• Unaffected by Weather: PROE, CPOE, and Plays Run were slightly off from their baseline

• Affected by Weather: PROE, CPOE, and Plays Run were somewhat or significantly down from their baseline

It would break apart an already limited population, but the names and offenses could help determine why each succeeded or failed.

Unsurprisingly, the “Aided by Weather” category had the fewest games. But the leader of the group made the analysis simple.

Russell Wilson’s 32-28 dog fight with Cleveland featured a 1-point spread against a Browns offense that was top 10 in neutral passing. As a result, we got classic Wilson with nine rushing attempts. The matchup dictated the outcome and not the weather.

Conversely, Fields's run-in with Bills Mafia, already nursing a separated shoulder, highlighted the need for QBs to have a larger, more efficient passing component. Fields entered Week 16 dead last in EPA per dropback, and Buffalo’s defense was a top-10 unit.

Again, a deep dive into the two teams would’ve set similar expectations for the game. Let’s look at the second group.

Joe Burrow, Josh Allen, Kyler Murray, and Ben Roethlisberger were the only QBs with a positive PROE as their baseline. So passing alone wasn’t the differentiator. It was scrambling.

While unplanned, scrambles are highly efficient as QBs turn a would-be sack into a positive gain. Six of the seven signal-callers who averaged more than 16.0 fantasy points in 20+ mph winds were top 10 in total scrambles during their respective seasons.

Meanwhile, pure pocket passers like Derek Carr, Teddy Bridgewater, and Josh Rosen already had questionable arm talent (as it relates to fantasy) without even a minor rushing role to raise their floor. Their ADP or DFS price would already reflect their ceiling potential, but this archetype of QB doesn’t fare well in high winds.

Yes, Chiefs fans, I know. Patrick Mahomes doesn’t belong in this group.

He had the seventh-highest fantasy-point average in the group, and he’s sitting next to Taylor Heinicke. But don’t blame me. Blame the teams he faced.

• 2021, Week 14 vs. LV - Final Score: 48 to 9

• 2021, Week 16 vs. PIT - Final Score: 36 to 10

• 2020, Week 13 vs. LV - Final Score: 40 to 9

If gravity doesn’t affect Mahomes, neither does the weather.

And while Rodgers led the group in average points, he did it in true Rodgers fashion. Across his three games with wind speeds over 20 mph, four of his six touchdowns came on passes of seven yards or less. They converted one from the goal line.

Regardless, most of this group (10 of 14) led run-oriented offenses that only leaned further into their strength.

And still, without a scrambling element to their game, the probability of them failing to meet expectations only increased.