DRAFT RECAPS - 1ST PICK

1ST OVERALL PICK – TELL SLOAN I SAID WHAT UP – DBD:

Before I get into it there are two matters of business: first, this team name is pretty funny. Of course comes from Entourage when Seth Green is being a dick to E. Dyl might be on an Entourage binge right now which is great, that show never gets old.

Second: I realize these are a little long and a little stale, but hopefully you enjoyed them. Between work, baby classes, family events and regular life I just don’t have enough time to make these great again. I think during the season I might go to an every other week schedule and/or really cut down on length to make the writeups more palatable. Either way I’ll be giving you guys something as usual… tbd.

Rounds 1-5:

Of all the slaps in the face I’ve endured over the last year, there are a few that stick out. First I lose to Dyl in the finals when I clearly had the best team. Dyl put up his season high during the finals and I lost 172-135. Slap. The second slap came when I personally handpicked DBD to get the first overall pick in the draft. Slap. As a result of that he got to take my favorite player in the NFL – non-TB12 category. Slap. Obviously I need to tinker with the draft lotto a little more because the reigning chump should never be allowed to pick first. Slap.

Saquon Barkley is a man among boys in the NFL. As I noted in last year’s draft recap, based on his combine numbers he’s stronger than Hall of Fame Tackle Joe Thomas, he’s quicker than Desean Jackson, he’s faster than Devin Hester and he jumps higher than Julio Jones. Oh and he’s 6 foot tall, two hundred and THIRTY pounds. Last season he was 2nd in rushing yards with 1,300 and rushed for over 5 yards per carry. He caught 91 passes which was 2nd among all RBs and turned that into 700 yards. Oh and he led the NFL in all purpose yards with over 2,000. He is the best running back in the NFL, period.

Dbd went RB heavy in the 2nd and 3rd with Dalvin Cook and Leonard Fournette. Dalvin Cook is coming off a disappointing season, but he’s the RB1 in Minnesota and doesn’t have Latavius Murray stealing touches anymore. He’s almost 2 years removed from the ACL injury and has looked good in the preseason (85 yard TD run on one of his few carries). I think he’ll make his owners very happy this season.

Leonard Fournette made his owners very UNhappy in 2018. He was a consensus top 15 pick, but due to injury and underperformance finished as RB39 in our scoring. The Jaguars have improved their line, added Little Dick Nick at QB and Fournette is healthy. Assuming he stays healthy, he should put up something close to 1,200 yards rushing, 500 yards receiving and 10-plus TDs.

DbD addressed the WR position in the 4th and 5th rounds with Stefon Diggs and Brandin Cooks. These two were both in the top 14 of WR scoring last season and combined for 182 catches, 2,200 yards and 15 TDs. They both play with above average QBs and while both have other WRs to contend with on their own teams, that may be a good thing as defenses can’t focus too much on them. This will be a great WR-duo given the price tag. (Yes Diggs is questionable for this week, but he’ll be fine this season even if he sits 2-3 games.)

Rounds 6-10:

DbD wanted more WR help in the 6th and 7th rounds so he took Alshon Jeffery and Dede Westbrook as his 3rd and 4th receivers. Alshon is always kind of a headache, but he did finish as a top 30 WR last year. Despite missing 3 games he still put up 65-843-6 last year and I’d expect similar numbers this year. He may need to fill in for Diggs in Week 1, so this pick may come in handy early on.

Westbrook was a popular sleeper during draft season and is coming off of a solid rookie season. He caught 66 passes for 700 yards and 6 TDs last year and that was with Blake Bortles and a few no-names at QB. Little Dick Nick should help push those numbers up at least 20%. If he puts up about 80 catches for 950 yards and 7-8 TDs this pick will look great in hindsight.

I shat on the Jordan Howard pick in Kev’s recap and guess who was drafted immediately after him? The Eagles “starting” RB Miles Sanders. Sanders is a rookie who put up great numbers at Penn State in his senior year – 1,300 yards 9 total TDs. He didn’t play much his freshman or sophomore year, but Saquon was ahead of him on the depth chart so we can’t knock him for that. It may be a committee to start the year, but Sanders will RUN away with the job as the season progresses. Dad jokes.  

DbD took his TE in the 9th round – Vance McDonald of the Steelers. Someone has to absorb those Antonio Brown targets right? McDonald had 72 targets last year and was TE11 so I think it’s fair to push those numbers up to 100 targets and a top 8 TE this year. I think everyone saw that stiff-arm he had…

DbD had one of the better steals in the draft in the 10th round – Matt Breida. Breida was RB25 last season and was recently listed as the starter for the 49ers. He’s a little smaller than a typical back (5-11, 190), but he’s no Tarik Cohen. He racked up 800 rushing and 200 receiving yards last year and will be the 5th RB on DbD’s team. Just seems unfair.  

Rounds 11-15:

In the 11th round we had the rookie TJ Hockenson – TE for the Lions. Detroit’s offense is really weird and difficult to predict, but if Vance McDonald doesn’t work out Hockenson could be a good fallback. Last year at Iowa he put up 49 catches for 760 yards and 5 TDs – anything similar to that would earn him a spot in the top 10 of TE scoring.

Yet another steal in the 12th round – Curtis Samuel of the Panthers. I don’t think any player has been more hyped during the offseason and I’m shaking my head at how/why I picked Emmanuel Sanders and Corey Davis ahead of him. In fairness I had been drinking since 11:45 AM. Regardless this was another great pick and Samuels showed a nose for the endzone last year – 7 TDs as a rookie.

The last three rounds were spent on a QB, a defense and a kicker. Jared Goff is insane value in the 13th round and finished as QB7 last year. If not for his 0 point Week 14 performance he would have probably been top 5. Ton of weapons, creative offensive coach and he’ll hold down DbD’s QB spot for most of the season. (This type of pick is exactly why I criticized the Baker Mayfield pick.)

For defense he took the Browns and for kicker he got Robbie Gould. The Browns D will be good this year and Miles Garrett has been unstoppable in the preseason. They open with the Titans and that could get ugly for Mariota & co. Robbie Gould is a good kicker and he took him in the last round – fantasy football 101.

Grade:

A+

Prediction:

DbD will go 8-5 and unfortunately wins the league again. Starting with the #1 pick is a huge advantage and the rest of the draft went very well for him. Value pick after value pick after value pick. There isn’t a single weakness on this team and while a little/large piece of me will always hate DbD, I don’t see how anyone could argue that this is the best team. (ESPN has him projected as top 3 in our league.)