Ezekiel Elliott Thread: Should we Buy or Sell?

[PR0v3]

It doesn’t really matter who you have when talking about elite tier players. Whether you win or lose will have much more to do with weekly variance/luck and the rest of your team. Zeke, Gurley, Barkley, CMC, Kamara, Gordon are all great and nitpicking between them is kind of pointless.

[Vcize]

It doesn’t really matter who you have when talking about elite tier players. Whether you win or lose will have much more to do with weekly variance/luck and the rest of your team. Zeke, Gurley, Barkley, CMC, Kamara, Gordon are all great and nitpicking between them is kind of pointless.

I disagree with this bigly.

4ppg is 4ppg. It makes no sense to me that people will pay a fortune to upgrade 4ppg at TE or WR2 or somewhere else in their lineup but just shrug off 4ppg here as "eh, it's basically equal".

What are people paying to upgrade from Hooper to Kittle at TE? Or from Tyler Boyd to Michael Thomas at WR? The points difference there is the same as the difference between Zeke and Gurley over the last two years.

If someone wants to argue as above that they think Zeke will catch Gurley now that he has Cooper on board then I can see that logic. But just blindly shrugging off 4-5ppg among options just because they're both elite makes zero sense.

[PR0v3]

It doesn’t really matter who you have when talking about elite tier players. Whether you win or lose will have much more to do with weekly variance/luck and the rest of your team. Zeke, Gurley, Barkley, CMC, Kamara, Gordon are all great and nitpicking between them is kind of pointless.

I disagree with this bigly.

4ppg is 4ppg. It makes no sense to me that people will pay a fortune to upgrade 4ppg at TE or WR2 or somewhere else in their lineup but just shrug off 4ppg here as "eh, it's basically equal".

What are people paying to upgrade from Hooper to Kittle at TE? Or from Tyler Boyd to Michael Thomas at WR? The points difference there is the same as the difference between Zeke and Gurley over the last two years.

If someone wants to argue as above that they think Zeke will catch Gurley now that he has Cooper on board then I can see that logic. But just blindly shrugging off 4-5ppg among options just because they're both elite makes zero sense.

The thing is, when you are paying to upgrade Boyd to Thomas, you know for a fact that you are trading the #2 pass catching option on a mediocre/bad offense for the #1 pass catching on an elite offense. When you pay to upgrade Hooper for Kittle you know you are trading the #4? Pass catching option for the #1 pass catching option. The upside differences and week winning potential differences between the two are irrefutable. The relative certainty with which you are dealing with is very distinct.

With RBs what would you really be getting when you try to upgrade say Kamara to Gurley or Gordon to CMC? They are all the #1 offensive option in great offenses and they all have similar upside. Who is to say which of these guys will be the best going forward? For the first 4 weeks it looked like Kamara was the man, then it looked like Gurley was the man, now it looks like Saquon and CMC are the mans. Sure in hindsight someone will end being the guy you wished you had, but it’s nearly impossible to predict exactly who it will be.

You shouldn’t be struggling to make the playoffs with these guys, and if you are it’s doubtful your team has a chance of winning it all anyways. So why fret over small differences in past performance when the difference between who performs best between these guys in the fantasy playoffs and moving forward is basically completely unpredictable? If the difference between making the fantasy playoffs would have been the difference between this year’s CMC and Gurley, your roster likely had way more bigger issues.

TLDR;
It’s much harder to distinguish who will actually be better/best moving forward between guys like Gurley, Gordon, CMC, Barkley, Kamara than it is with guys like Boyd and Michael Thomas or Hooper and Kittle or whoever, even though the eventual/hindsight PPG differences between them may be similar. This makes it not worth worrying about which guy is the flavor of the moment and also leads to potential extreme value backfiring if you make a trade to acquire the current man of the hour.

[Jfever]

It doesn’t really matter who you have when talking about elite tier players. Whether you win or lose will have much more to do with weekly variance/luck and the rest of your team. Zeke, Gurley, Barkley, CMC, Kamara, Gordon are all great and nitpicking between them is kind of pointless.

I disagree with this bigly.

4ppg is 4ppg. It makes no sense to me that people will pay a fortune to upgrade 4ppg at TE or WR2 or somewhere else in their lineup but just shrug off 4ppg here as "eh, it's basically equal".

What are people paying to upgrade from Hooper to Kittle at TE? Or from Tyler Boyd to Michael Thomas at WR? The points difference there is the same as the difference between Zeke and Gurley over the last two years.

If someone wants to argue as above that they think Zeke will catch Gurley now that he has Cooper on board then I can see that logic. But just blindly shrugging off 4-5ppg among options just because they're both elite makes zero sense.

If only it were that predictable.... We'd all have winning teams each year. Do you REALLY think that because one rb is avg 4 ppg more than another right now that it will remain to be true at this time next year? I"m hoping you understand that that is very likely to change when it comes to rb and much less likely to change when it comes to other positions like wr for example.

[Jigga94]

"Bigly"... had a tough time taking your argument seriously after that

[badbuddah]

In the short term sure Zeke has outperformed Gurley. However do I think moving forward it will continue? Likely not. Possible this year but not in future years. Gurley and Saquon are a small tier above. However having any of those guys when paired with other good players can result in a title. I wouldn't say I lost in the first round because I didn't have one, Cooper is bullshit and I hate him, but having a stud that can score 40+ from time to time I think is necessary for the playoffs and why the guy who beat me has been a 3 time league champion.

[Vcize]

It doesn’t really matter who you have when talking about elite tier players. Whether you win or lose will have much more to do with weekly variance/luck and the rest of your team. Zeke, Gurley, Barkley, CMC, Kamara, Gordon are all great and nitpicking between them is kind of pointless.

I disagree with this bigly.

4ppg is 4ppg. It makes no sense to me that people will pay a fortune to upgrade 4ppg at TE or WR2 or somewhere else in their lineup but just shrug off 4ppg here as "eh, it's basically equal".

What are people paying to upgrade from Hooper to Kittle at TE? Or from Tyler Boyd to Michael Thomas at WR? The points difference there is the same as the difference between Zeke and Gurley over the last two years.

If someone wants to argue as above that they think Zeke will catch Gurley now that he has Cooper on board then I can see that logic. But just blindly shrugging off 4-5ppg among options just because they're both elite makes zero sense.

If only it were that predictable.... We'd all have winning teams each year. Do you REALLY think that because one rb is avg 4 ppg more than another right now that it will remain to be true at this time next year? I"m hoping you understand that that is very likely to change when it comes to rb and much less likely to change when it comes to other positions like wr for example.

It's not like we're talking about 3 weeks here. 2 full years is a pretty statistically significant sample for this.

[Pullo Vision]

In 2016, Elliott had over 300 carries (not touches carries) and averaged 5.1 YPC. In 2017, he had 242 carries in 10 games (pace of 387 over 16) for 4.1 YPC. In 2018, he had over 300 carries for 4.7 YPC.

As the only back to get over 300 carries in either 2016 or 2018, anyone concerned about this workload? How could this affect his career?

[Phaded]

There is obviously a concern with longevity, but he has also maintained good health throughout his career so far.

Any running back has longevity concerns. Until he shows signs of slowing down or getting injured though, I would not worry.

[Elroypedro]

Carry count correlates to wear and tear and eventually falling off a production cliff between 1500 and 2000 carries. There are obviously exceptions. But Zeke is stout and built for it. He doesn’t take many, if any, hits that he can’t easily handle. I think he does have a slightly shorter average peak length than guys like CMC and Kamara who keep their carries low(RB receptions don’t correlate to wear and tear), but he should still have an average of 2-4 more years of peak production at that rate of carries.

[bjd5211]

Absolutely 0 concerns for at least 3 more years, he's a special talent and athlete. He gets more carries than a lot of modern RBs sure, but RBs used to have far more touches and did fine. LT and Emmitt easily had those numbers or more and were productive for long stretches, as were several other RBs. Obviously a relatively major injury can change things, but as of right now he's in about as close to perfect health as can be reasonably expected for someone in his position.

Off-field issues are a far bigger concern for me, and that's not even a massive concern in my valuation of him. He is locked in as my #3 overall RB, and he's closer to the top 2 (Barkley and Gurley) than 4 and 5 (CMC and Kamara) are to him.

[ArrylT]

Always a back of the mind concern with any RB with a heavy workload - but we won't know until further down the road whether or not Elliott can be like a Frank Gore (5th all-time in carries) or more like DeMarco Murray. Is there any correlation between more receiving work & thus more total touches and a shorter career?

[ericanadian]

In 2016, Elliott had over 300 carries (not touches carries) and averaged 5.1 YPC. In 2017, he had 242 carries in 10 games (pace of 387 over 16) for 4.1 YPC. In 2018, he had over 300 carries for 4.7 YPC.

As the only back to get over 300 carries in either 2016 or 2018, anyone concerned about this workload? How could this affect his career?

I don’t really worry about it until the carries get into the 380 range in a single season.

[honcho55]

I can’t say it’s zero concern, but bottom line is if that’s your top concern with a fantasy foosball player, you have a top asset, obviously.

Bit of a tangent obviously but with zeke in my lineup this year I would start to stress out when the cowboys wouldn’t feed him for a series or two. They would sputter, and everyone and their sister knew why. Just think that it’s fun to note: as much as I stressed about his touches, multiply that by 100 for cowboys GM/HC/OC, they know it works if he gets carries, but they are also concerned with longevity.

[FantasyFreak]

Seems like guys like Gordon and Gurley both started breaking down after multiple years of heavy workloads. Zeke did get that 6 game break a few years back, but I would think he is a candidate to get knicked up a bit this year.