Speaker 1: This is the Labor Podcast with your host JJ zach
Speaker 1: j J zacher Reef. What's up everyone, It's JJ zachar
Speaker 1: Esen in this episode eleven fourteen of the Late Round
Speaker 1: Fantasy Football podcast. Thanks for tuning in. People tend to
Speaker 1: think of regression to the mean in a negative way,
Speaker 1: that if someone regresses that someone got worse, they did
Speaker 1: something great and then that greatness turned into goodness or mediocrity.
Speaker 1: But regression can work in the opposite direction too. Regression
Speaker 1: to the mean is the tendency for unusually extreme performances,
Speaker 1: whether they're really good or really bad, to move closer
Speaker 1: to what's typical over time. If someone does something completely
Speaker 1: out of this world, chances are he won't be able
Speaker 1: to repeat that performance. On the flip side, if someone
Speaker 1: gets all the opportunity in the world and just doesn't
Speaker 1: come through, it's easy to assume that he's just bad
Speaker 1: at football. But what if the evidence suggests otherwise. What
Speaker 1: if he was simply on the wrang side of variants.
Speaker 1: I say it all the time. I analyze fantasy football
Speaker 1: through numbers because fantasy football is a game about numbers,
Speaker 1: and regression is one of the biggest aspects of that,
Speaker 1: extreme outcomes are often a mix of skill and randomness,
Speaker 1: and while skill tends to stick around, randomness usually doesn't.
Speaker 1: That's why regression is so important to understand. I'd argue
Speaker 1: it's the most important concept in fantasy football. On today's episode,
Speaker 1: we're going to dig into regression to the mean. We'll
Speaker 1: look at players. We'll look at teams who are likely
Speaker 1: to look different this season, not because they've suddenly become
Speaker 1: better or worse, but because some of what happened in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five simply wasn't sustainable. Some players benefited from that,
Speaker 1: others got burned by it. Understanding the difference can help
Speaker 1: you identify some of the best values in your fantasy
Speaker 1: drafts this year. Now, before get into all of that,
Speaker 1: I did want to send another reminder to check out
Speaker 1: the Late Round Draft Guide. There's over two hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy pages of content that includes game theory, strategy, ways
Speaker 1: of spot, breakouts and busts, players to target, players don't void,
Speaker 1: and more. You get cheat sheets in the guide, which
Speaker 1: includes a cheat sheet of our new market score metric.
Speaker 1: It's all updated weekly directly to your email inbox. Check
Speaker 1: it out. Learn more at lateround dot Com. I think
Speaker 1: the easiest place to start with this episode is with
Speaker 1: the Rams now obviously a team led by Sean McVay,
Speaker 1: and with the amount of offensive talent that they have,
Speaker 1: it's gonna be good offensively, But that was also just
Speaker 1: on another level. Last year. Now the Rams had Mike
Speaker 1: Lafleur now coaching the Arizona Cardinals as their offensive coordinator
Speaker 1: for three years. He got Matthew Stafford for fifteen, sixteen
Speaker 1: and seventeen games during that three year stretch. The Rams
Speaker 1: during those seasons through for twenty six, twenty two and
Speaker 1: forty six touchdowns. Their touchdown rate touchdowns divided by attempts
Speaker 1: four point five percent, three point nine percent, and seven
Speaker 1: point seven percent. Since twenty eleven, fourteen teams had touchdown
Speaker 1: rates of seven percent or higher in one season while
Speaker 1: having played another, so the Rams obviously don't qualify for this.
Speaker 1: Only one of those teams stayed above the seven percent
Speaker 1: mark year over year, but that team, the twenty eleven Packers,
Speaker 1: still saw decline and touchdown rate. They went from nine
Speaker 1: point two percent, which is absolutely insane. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: peak Aaron Rodgers stuff right there, but it went all
Speaker 1: the way down to seven point two percent. Those teams
Speaker 1: averaged forty two point one passing touchdowns in that high
Speaker 1: touchdown rate season. On average, they fell down to twenty
Speaker 1: nine point six passing touchdowns the following year. Now, some
Speaker 1: of you are gonna say, well, they got DeVante Adams.
Speaker 1: He drove this figure up, and yeah, for sure he
Speaker 1: helped things out, but we also can't just assume that
Speaker 1: something like that's gonna be sustainable year in and year out.
Speaker 1: Adams in particular is really interesting because obviously he scored
Speaker 1: fourteen times last year. That's a super high number given
Speaker 1: the amount of volume that he actually saw, and he
Speaker 1: was often just like used as their goal line back. Essentially,
Speaker 1: his expected touchdown total was right around that mark. He
Speaker 1: didn't actually outperform in the touchdown column last year, and
Speaker 1: I would imagine a lot of people are gonna point
Speaker 1: that out, that Adams won't regress because he performed around
Speaker 1: expectation when it came to touchdowns last year. But my
Speaker 1: argument against that is the fact that Adams tied for
Speaker 1: the most end zone targets last year of any wide
Speaker 1: receiver since twenty eleven, and he had more inside the
Speaker 1: five targets inside the ten targets and end zone targets
Speaker 1: per game than any other wide receiver in that sample.
Speaker 1: His other peripherals were fine, and he converted at a
Speaker 1: pretty normal rate. He just had so much volume around
Speaker 1: the end zone that alone is just naturally going to
Speaker 1: be difficult to repeat. And here's the math behind that.
Speaker 1: Adams had one point nine to three end zone targets
Speaker 1: per game last year, absolutely absurd. That number basically laps
Speaker 1: every other wide receiver since twenty eleven. But if you
Speaker 1: look at the wide receivers who had over one point
Speaker 1: five end zone targets per game since twenty eleven, when
Speaker 1: those guys played eight or more games the following year,
Speaker 1: they've historically seen a thirty five percent drop from one
Speaker 1: season to the next, and end zone targets per game,
Speaker 1: and naturally they are points per game dropped by about two. Now,
Speaker 1: this isn't to say that DeVante Adams isn't avoid for me,
Speaker 1: though I have toyed with the idea because I am
Speaker 1: a little bit below market. The reason it's not so obvious, though,
Speaker 1: is because I do think the Rams are still going
Speaker 1: to be really good offensively. But do keep in mind
Speaker 1: that it would be shocking, legitimately shocking to see Adams
Speaker 1: and Matthew Stafford repeat their twenty twenty five performance. So
Speaker 1: all of that about the Rams, that's a more obvious
Speaker 1: spot for regression this year. If you want to go
Speaker 1: a little bit more outside the box, look at Baltimore
Speaker 1: and specifically Mark Andrews. There's a very real chance of
Speaker 1: Mark Andrews is just cooked. I don't think we know
Speaker 1: for sure, but let's keep an open mind. With that
Speaker 1: being said, last season he had a two point one
Speaker 1: five yards after the catch per reception rate. That's according
Speaker 1: to PFF. He's never had a season below three points
Speaker 1: in that statistic, and even in twenty twenty four, if
Speaker 1: you just want to say, oh, this is just Mark
Speaker 1: Andrews getting old, he was at three point five to eight. Now,
Speaker 1: the interesting thing is that Andrews had a lower average
Speaker 1: up to target last year two. It was the lowest
Speaker 1: of his career at eight point zero yards. So all
Speaker 1: of that combined to give him just an atrocious one
Speaker 1: point two to three yards per route run, the worst
Speaker 1: of his career by a huge margin. His other lowest
Speaker 1: was one point eight eight, which did come in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty four. I would actually anticipate that number improving from
Speaker 1: one year to the next. But there's a catch. We've
Speaker 1: had thirteen tight ends since twenty eleven have a YAK
Speaker 1: per reception below three and one year while hitting fifty
Speaker 1: or more targets in that season and the following season.
Speaker 1: Twelve of the thirteen players improved on that number year
Speaker 1: over year, and eleven of them they escaped the three
Speaker 1: point zero and below bucket entirely. On average, They've gone
Speaker 1: from two point six yards after the catch per catch
Speaker 1: to four point one to three. That's a strong improvement.
Speaker 1: The problem is that even though they got better after
Speaker 1: the catch, we didn't see a massive improvement in fantasy
Speaker 1: production from those players. Now. Albeit it's a smaller sample size,
Speaker 1: but one of the guys that sawid decline happen, the
Speaker 1: only one who got worse year over year was end
Speaker 1: of career Tony Gonzalez from twenty twelve to twenty thirteen.
Speaker 1: So my stance here is that Andrews isn't necessarily a
Speaker 1: total fade. He's just a sincerely risky bet even with
Speaker 1: favorable YAK regression coming. Now, let's keep this theme going
Speaker 1: with the Ravens. One area where Andrews could be helped
Speaker 1: tremendously is with passing volume. I feel like one of
Speaker 1: the most overlooked storylines in fantasy football is how unbelievably
Speaker 1: run heavy the Ravens were last year. Just in terms
Speaker 1: of raw volume, Baltimore had their second lowest pass rate
Speaker 1: over expected of the entire Lamar Jackson era last year,
Speaker 1: but because they ran fewer plays and with Lamar Jackson
Speaker 1: banged up, they finished the season with just twenty four
Speaker 1: point eight pass attempts per game. Since twenty eleven, we've
Speaker 1: had seventeen teams with next season data get to fewer
Speaker 1: than twenty eight pass attempts per game. Those teams, on average,
Speaker 1: saw an uptick of four point four pass attemps per game,
Speaker 1: seventy six raw pass attempts to nearly four hundred passing
Speaker 1: yards year over year. Just four of those teams stayed
Speaker 1: under the twenty eight pass attempts per game mark, and
Speaker 1: remember Baltimore was under twenty five pass attempts per game.
Speaker 1: This is a key reason that Andrews might be okay,
Speaker 1: and it's a bigger reason to be bullish on Zave Flowers.
Speaker 1: The dude was an efficiency machine last year. He took
Speaker 1: another step forward, and if he's able to see a
Speaker 1: little bit more work close to the end zone while
Speaker 1: the Ravens take a step forward in passing volume, it
Speaker 1: could be a monster year for Flowers. I'm bullish on
Speaker 1: the Eagles offense turning things around this year, and someone
Speaker 1: who would benefit from that greatly is Saquon Barkley. Barkley
Speaker 1: was disappointing last year from a fantasy perspective. He scored
Speaker 1: fewer than fifteen PPR points per game. A huge reason
Speaker 1: for that lack of production in fantasy, at least the
Speaker 1: lack of production given his cost, was what he did
Speaker 1: at the goal line. We know that Jalen Hurts is
Speaker 1: going to steal touchdowns in that offense, but Barkley still
Speaker 1: had fourteen goal line attempts last year. That was a
Speaker 1: top fifteen number across the league at running back. Each
Speaker 1: one of those running backs who hit at least fourteen
Speaker 1: goal line rushes scored at least four times on those attempts.
Speaker 1: Sakuon Barkley scored once. Now, obviously Barkley isn't benefiting from
Speaker 1: the really short stuff at the goal line, but still,
Speaker 1: this is really bad. We just don't have a large
Speaker 1: sample of running backs who converted so few goal line
Speaker 1: attempts one year, who then went on to see a
Speaker 1: bulky number of goal line rushes the following year. It's
Speaker 1: not to say that's going to happen to Barkley. It's
Speaker 1: just such a rarity because he was so bad at
Speaker 1: converting last year. With that being said, outside of twenty
Speaker 1: twenty five, Barkley's converted about thirty four percent of his
Speaker 1: goal line rushes last year. To repeat, he was at
Speaker 1: se seven percent. I would anticipate a nice bounce back
Speaker 1: from him, at least at the goal line, allowing him
Speaker 1: to get that double digit touchdown mark once again. And
Speaker 1: if the Eagles offense does take a step forward versus
Speaker 1: last year, that shouldn't even be at the detriment of
Speaker 1: Jalen Hurts, especially because Hurts was far below his typical
Speaker 1: rushing volume totals last year. But Philly just might score
Speaker 1: more in general when talking about regression, of course, general
Speaker 1: team environment changes are a big reason we see natural
Speaker 1: shifts and statistics from one year to the next. We
Speaker 1: should always consider context when we're looking at this stuff,
Speaker 1: and that's important when I bring up these next two teams,
Speaker 1: the Vikings and the Raiders both struggled last year offensively,
Speaker 1: ranking bottom ten and drives ending and scores and drives
Speaker 1: ending and touchdowns. They were inefficient on offense. That can
Speaker 1: lower the number of plays that a team runs. If
Speaker 1: they're not converting, they're not sustaining drives, they're not giving
Speaker 1: us more plays for fantasy purposes. But then on top
Speaker 1: of that, they ran at a slower pace. Their seconds
Speaker 1: per play rates were both bottom ten in the league.
Speaker 1: That resulted in the Vikings running fifty six point one
Speaker 1: plays per game last year. Vegas was at fifty five
Speaker 1: point eight. Now Miami was in there too, but the
Speaker 1: other two teams, they're a little bit more interesting given
Speaker 1: the fantasy implications, but sure throw Miami in the mix.
Speaker 1: Two sixteen teams since twenty eleven had fifty eight or
Speaker 1: fewer plays per game run in a season. The following year,
Speaker 1: those teams saw an average uptick and plays run per
Speaker 1: game of four point eight. That equates to about eighty
Speaker 1: more plays run across the season, and many of those
Speaker 1: additional plays they converted to passing plays too, So I
Speaker 1: think we should see a little bit more passing volume
Speaker 1: in those two offenses this year. All of those teams
Speaker 1: with very few plays run in one season, every single
Speaker 1: one of them saw an uptick and plays run per
Speaker 1: game the following year. With so much change in Minnesota,
Speaker 1: given the probable starting quarterback, and then the sweeping change
Speaker 1: in Vegas, we should expect more plays run for both offenses.
Speaker 1: That's great news obviously for the stud players like Justin Jefferson,
Speaker 1: Ashing Gent and Brock Bauers. I'm not gonna throw Miami
Speaker 1: in the mix there though, because I do think they're
Speaker 1: in an incredibly unique situation. There's a lot of interesting
Speaker 1: deep ball data with quarterback each year, and it's no
Speaker 1: different this year. Drake May was a baller last year
Speaker 1: on deep passes, and yes, of course there's ability embedded
Speaker 1: in this. Some dudes are just better at converting throws
Speaker 1: fifteen or more air yards down the field but make
Speaker 1: it pleted over fifty eight percent of his passes that
Speaker 1: traveled fifteen or more air yards last season. Among quarterbacks
Speaker 1: with thirty or more of those types of passes, that's
Speaker 1: only been done eight other times since twenty eleven, and
Speaker 1: since twenty eleven, there have been twenty four quarterbacks who
Speaker 1: had thirty or more deep and intermediate throws in year
Speaker 1: en and in year en plus one, where they had
Speaker 1: a fifty three percent completion rate on those throws in
Speaker 1: that original year. So Drake May fifty eight percent. He
Speaker 1: certainly falls into this group. Of those two twenty four
Speaker 1: quarterbacks who had year over year thirty or more deep
Speaker 1: ball throws with a fifty three percent completion rate, they
Speaker 1: average a dropping completion rate of seven percentage points. Seventy
Speaker 1: five percent of those players dip below fifty three percent,
Speaker 1: and Drew Brees is a huge reason that that looks
Speaker 1: as good as it does, because he appeared six times
Speaker 1: on that list. He held at fifty three percent or
Speaker 1: greater in three of those seasons. Meanwhile, these quarterbacks saw
Speaker 1: a drop of one point two points per game year
Speaker 1: over year, largely because they weren't converting on those deep
Speaker 1: passes quite as frequently. Now I know the Patriots added
Speaker 1: Aj Brown. I do think that Drake May is a
Speaker 1: special player. He could easily buck this trend. It's just
Speaker 1: something to keep in mind. You can look in the
Speaker 1: opposite side of this though, too, because deep ball completion
Speaker 1: rate it's a number that regresses. We see a decent
Speaker 1: number of quarterbacks with below forty percent completion rates on
Speaker 1: deep throws. There have been one hundred and forty five
Speaker 1: of them since twenty eleven who were below that forty
Speaker 1: percent mark and who had thirty or more deep ball
Speaker 1: attempts in one year and the next year. Those quarterbacks
Speaker 1: typically saw an uptick and deep ball completion rate of
Speaker 1: about five percentage points a year over year, and they
Speaker 1: usually increase their fantasy points per game as well by
Speaker 1: a full point. That's not a huge shock, though. If
Speaker 1: they're completing those passes more frequently, they're gonna score more points.
Speaker 1: But this is good news for some relevant quarterbacks this year,
Speaker 1: including Baker Mayfield, CJ. Stroud, Jackson, Dart Bow Knicks, and
Speaker 1: Patrick Mahomes. Mahomes is particularly interesting because he used to
Speaker 1: have seasons above that forty five completion rate mark all
Speaker 1: the time, but over the last two he's been at
Speaker 1: thirty two and thirty six percent. That's pretty low. Patrick
Speaker 1: Mahomes has not been good at converting deep passes the
Speaker 1: last couple of years. It's not a guarantee that he
Speaker 1: sees this massive uptick, but I do think that we
Speaker 1: should project it to happen just strictly based on regression.
Speaker 1: They just need their down the field threats to stay healthy.
Speaker 1: A lot of those other quarterbacks had just named they
Speaker 1: have additional help coming that should aid them in regressing.
Speaker 1: To the mean, Jackson, Smith and Jigba just put together
Speaker 1: one of the most impressive wide receiver seasons that we've
Speaker 1: ever seen, and typically when things go really well for
Speaker 1: a player, it's tough to repeat that production. JSN had
Speaker 1: a yards per target rate of eleven last year. We've
Speaker 1: had twenty eight wide receivers since twenty eleven who had
Speaker 1: between ten point five and eleven point five yards per
Speaker 1: target while seeing fifty or more targets in year en
Speaker 1: and in year N plus one so one season and
Speaker 1: the following season. On average, those players have seen a
Speaker 1: dip in yards per target of one point eight. Their
Speaker 1: PPR points per game it dropped by nearly one point six.
Speaker 1: That's not the only thing that was pretty crazy from
Speaker 1: JSN last year. He had a catch rate over expected
Speaker 1: of plus eleven percent, and again, historically, players with rates
Speaker 1: above ten percent they almost always regrets. Of the forty
Speaker 1: five since twenty eleven who are above that mark, the
Speaker 1: average drop in actual catch rate was nearly eight percentage points,
Speaker 1: and again those guys saw a dip in points per
Speaker 1: game of about one point five. The list goes on
Speaker 1: and on. For JSN, he was great last year, phenomenal,
Speaker 1: but he probably won't be as efficient this year. But
Speaker 1: there is one area where things could look better for
Speaker 1: him in twenty twenty six, and that's with overall volume.
Speaker 1: The Seahawks had a minus six point seven pass rate
Speaker 1: over expected last year. Teams who have been between the
Speaker 1: minus five percent and the minus eight percent range since
Speaker 1: twenty eleven, there's forty eight teams. They've typically seen that
Speaker 1: number increase by over three percentage points year over year.
Speaker 1: Pass attempts per game that raises by two and a
Speaker 1: half in pass rates by about three percentage points. Seattle's
Speaker 1: defense should be excellent again this year, but there's no
Speaker 1: doubt that the Seattle offense was in a great situation
Speaker 1: in general. Last year, they ran the fewest number of
Speaker 1: plays in the league while trailing. We usually see some
Speaker 1: volatility with defenses year over year, so odds are that
Speaker 1: the Seahawks defense it won't be quite as good as
Speaker 1: last year, and that could give the Seahawks offense an
Speaker 1: uptick and passing volume, which hopefully will combat some of
Speaker 1: this JSN regression. The last item today has to do
Speaker 1: with the Arizona offense. I think the Cardinals are unbelievably
Speaker 1: interesting this year for fantasy football. They have really strong
Speaker 1: weapons and such question marks a quarterback. Well. First off,
Speaker 1: I think it's important that we're all aware the Cardinals
Speaker 1: led the league last year in pass attempts and at
Speaker 1: over thirty eight pass temps per game regressions. Likely seventy
Speaker 1: five percent of the teams with thirty five or more
Speaker 1: pass temps per game over the last five years saw
Speaker 1: fewer pass attempts than next year. All those dropbacks also
Speaker 1: led to a lot of routes run for their pass catchers.
Speaker 1: Trey McBride ran sixty seven more routes than any other
Speaker 1: tight end since at least twenty eleven. I said this before,
Speaker 1: but if McBride ran the second most routes at tight
Speaker 1: end last year, or just tied for first, think of
Speaker 1: it that way, his same fantasy points per route run
Speaker 1: rate he would have fallen from eighteen point six pper
Speaker 1: points per game to fifteen point four, which is still
Speaker 1: a great season, but given what he did in the
Speaker 1: touchdown column, it doesn't look quite as great. It's a
Speaker 1: little bit scary. But then Michael Wilson he ran a
Speaker 1: lot of routes last year too. Only Jamar Chase ran
Speaker 1: more routes in the regular season at wide receiver than
Speaker 1: Michael Wilson did, according to PFF, and it was by
Speaker 1: just one route. We usually see wide receivers with six
Speaker 1: hundred or more routes in one year. Michael Wilson was
Speaker 1: at six hundred and thirty one. We usually see them
Speaker 1: fall in routes run per game by about four year
Speaker 1: over year. That's something to keep in mind. Now, there
Speaker 1: are still reasons to believe Arizona's going to be pass
Speaker 1: heavy this year. They have a bad defense, and as
Speaker 1: I talked about in the Schedule Analysis episode, their schedule
Speaker 1: is actually brutal, which means more negative game scripts and
Speaker 1: more passing. But look, the bottom line here, there's just
Speaker 1: so much volatility. I'd anticipate a lower pass rate, and
Speaker 1: I do think that with a healthy Marvin Harrison Junior,
Speaker 1: it could flatten out some of that upside for everyone
Speaker 1: in this offense. No, look, there are obviously a ton
Speaker 1: of different things that I could have talked about on
Speaker 1: today's show because regression is everywhere in this numbers driven game,
Speaker 1: but I wanted to call out what I think are
Speaker 1: some of the biggest ones, some of the biggest items
Speaker 1: when it comes to regression, especially at the team level.
Speaker 1: Hopefully it made you think a little bit differently about
Speaker 1: some of these teams and some of these players. That's
Speaker 1: it for today's show, though, thanks to all of you
Speaker 1: for listening. If you yet subscribed to the Late Round
Speaker 1: Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are best ritching for
Speaker 1: it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and follow
Speaker 1: me on Twitter and on Blue Sky at Late Round QB.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening everyone. As a reminder, the Late Round
Speaker 1: Fantasy Football YouTube channel we will be live on Wednesday
Speaker 1: at noon with the Late Round Fantasy Football Show. We're
Speaker 1: also doing a lot of live stream Bestball drafts, so
Speaker 1: make sure you subscribe YouTube dot com slash at LATEROUNDFF.
Speaker 1: We also have another episode of Becoming a Best Ball
Speaker 1: bro dropping this week, and then later in the week
Speaker 1: another episode of Late Round Perspectives. It's that time of year.
Speaker 1: I'm so excited. I hope you are too. Talk to
Speaker 1: you guys soon.