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Welcome and everybody to Fantasy Pros.

This is the Fantasy Football Podcast.

It is me, Joey Pee, Joe Pizapia.

Today I've got Jake Sealy from The Athletic and my Patty Cakes, Pat Fitzmorest,

hanging out, talking to a little football.

And today we're going to take a deep dive at some running backs

and give you the running backs that you need for 2026. We're going to go round by round. And what this

means is we're going to try to find our favorite target, our best value in every single round to go

through because you have lots of different approaches to your running back position this season.

You can go with the early RBs and you can go with the mid-R-Bs or you can go with some late RBs. However you want to do it, we're going to help you find the path to victory. And I know it's early. I know it's March. And everyone's talking about college basketball. But I don't care. I want to talk about football. And you do do too and that's why you're listening to the show today.

So we're going to get after that in just a moment. Don't forget. Subscribe to the channel. Drop your

comments below. We love having you here on the channel with us of Fantasy Pros. We're trying to get the 300,000 this year. And speaking of football, if you love football, hit up the tailgate. Again, the Tailgate, our new YouTube channel, Tailgate NFL, is here for you. It's mostly right now, myself, Debrough, and Andrew Erickson, just talking ball. We've got some great mock draft episodes on there. We've got some great breakdowns of post-free agency. We've had Jake Cielion. I'm sure Pat's going to come on and hang out with us, too. but we're getting a lot of guests from the industry as well, just for the football world. We have folks from NFL network come on. We had folks from pro football focus come on. So it's going to be a huge channel for us in 2026 and beyond. And it's not really fantasy. It's not really wagering. It's just football. So if you like football, and I know you do because you're listening to the show, go check

out the tailgate right now over on YouTube, subscribe, and of course, ring the bell to let goes ding. So we're doing about a show or two a week right now. And of course, as we get closer to NFL season and even draft season, we're going to do an even more content over there. So go check out the tailgate. All right, gentlemen, let's start with round one.

Jake, you drew first blood here.

So go ahead.

You get the... and even more content over there. So go check out the tailgate. All right, gentlemen, let's start with round one.

Jake, you drew first blood here. So go ahead. You get to pick your round one running back. And I'd do a double take because if I had Pat taking the round one running back that we love the most, I'm pretty sure he would have taken this guy. So I don't think Pat's can have any objections whatsoever. So, Celio, let's talk about your round one pick, your favorite guy, Jonathan Taylor.

Yeah. this guy. So I don't think Pat's can have any objections whatsoever. So, Celia, let's talk about your round one pick, your favorite guy, Jonathan Taylor. Well, it's favorite guy for value, because if you have the one, two, three pick, I mean, Robinson or Gibbs feels obvious, and there's only going to be, basically, if you're not drafting inside the top three or four, you're not going to have a play at this one. So I was looking at the next tier. And I have the next tier of James Cook, A. Chan, if you want to throw CMC in there, whatever it might be. I think people forgot that through week 10. Jonathan Taylor was destroying the running back position. Then it was about 26 fancy points per game, almost five more than the second closest. And yeah, Daniel Jones did play a few games after that before missing the rest of the season. But I think just Jonathan Taylor's upside if we have a healthy Daniel Jones for most of the year. The touchdown equity is going to be there. The touches are going to be there. Everything is going to be there where if people are worried about the volume, I get that. That's going to be an argument for if you want to chase these running backs or not. But if I'm looking at this next group for somebody who could get into tier one, which is what we care about, when you're drafting at the back end, middle round of the first, and you're saying what running back can get into that group with Bijan and Gibbs, I think the obvious and only answer in this group is Jonathan Taylor. And that's why if I have a pick, I'd rather be drafting like nine or ten because I feel like he's going to be there. And a lot of people are going to go back to CMC. A lot of people are going to still chase A. Chan and the more touches now that he has nobody left on that team, I'd rather just take Taylor. I would rather hopefully get him as the last of that second tier. All right. I know, Pat, you're probably not going to argue against Taylor, but I want to throw out a curveball to you because we are in the precipice of opening day for baseball as well. Fantasy Pros MLB, by the way, go check that out. Anyway, Pat, if Jeremiah Love should be around at the turn, is he a better investment potentially Taylor, due to the fact of age difference,

or would you rather have Taylor knowing the situation and what we've seen from a little bit of us

all in the fantasy community getting a little too excited too early about rookie running backs,

...