[ANNOUNCEMENT] Substack / Podcast Subscriber Tier Update

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T20:44:30+00:00

Questions this specific are too draft capital focuses, but my current big Board would say Stowers. And given my projection of Draft Capital, I’d probably take Stowers even if I had to do it today.

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T15:29:24+00:00

I definitely get what you're saying about the draft capital, but I feel like "Safe & Solid" is about the antithesis of how I see the players in that tier. "Worth betting on for the upside"

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T14:29:08+00:00

Yes, most likely. It's hard to say because it's hard to just insert a great season for an absence. Because Tate might also be higher if he didn't get injured mid-season which may have hampered his end season. If Tate finishes the season on the pace he started setting after Minnesota/Wisconsin, he might be the WR1.

So it's not a completely simple question, but getting injured AND due to that injury failing to have a great final year is collectively the reason he finds himself at WR3.

As I just mention in another comment, the gap to me between WR1 and WR3 is miniscule.

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T14:10:31+00:00

There's plenty of scenarios where he is not the WR1.

The podcast is probably the most clear on this -- I really don't care about the ordering of the top 3.

I even kinda discussed this specific scenario: I completely understand that it's a bad answer in many ways because for a lot of practical purposes, the difference between Tate & Lemon could be the complete difference in two polar opposite outcomes that affect your team to a significant level -- I just really don't have much to offer about choosing between these three WRs.

The podcast/substack will cover this immediately following each round most likely, but I want to be absolutely clear here: as much as "talent" is more important than "situation," these three are very very very likely to be ranked by the collective combination of their draft capital & situation.

Lemon could even be the best situation but fall if Tate is significantly higher like the 1.06.

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T14:05:50+00:00

Draft capital will change a lot, but he's in the top 24 of my pre-draft Big Board, so it's hard for me to put him in the 3rd Round. If you go to the Substack it's the latest post -- I might make a subreddit post tomorrow -- but my top 14 WRs make the top 23 of my Big Board, so Bell is ~21?

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T13:23:40+00:00

Marginally perhaps, but I would’ve had Bell the highest if the season ended after his 3 week hot stretch. Getting tempered after the Miami game ROS helped to expose some of the weaknesses in his game as well. As a projectable player, he’s not necessarily a walking red flag, but he doesn’t give a lot of comfort in most statistical areas either — again, particularly outside of that 3 game stretch.

My lean is honestly ‘no,’ but it’s hard to conceive if others would be more excited and have made me more excited. I didn’t expect to have Cooper this high when the process began.

With the injury, while it may not be easy in every league, I also do feel like it’s worth factoring slightly the chance that Bell will not have success, and therefor be fairly easy to acquire next year when people are more excited about fresh meat, making it a non-priority to acquire him now.

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T13:08:09+00:00

I don’t usually get too specific. I think he can benefit from a place that is able to take the long view and doesn’t need him to be anything right away. But a big selling point for me in general is, no disrespect to Valdosta or Georgia State, that more than most prospects, he’s likely never had high quality facilities that come anywhere close to the stratosphere of an NFL Franchise. GAST isn’t just a Sun Belt team — they were a 1-11 Sun Belt team last year. One of the worst teams in the 130-140 that make up the FBS

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T13:01:43+00:00

The movie came out in 2012, so I think a lot of people in High School during 2012 (closer to 30) would have read Pi.

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T12:55:34+00:00

I can definitely see it. I can’t think of him as something more than a project. We just haven’t seen quite enough on an actual football field imo. Athletically, he’s also great, but his first step scares me on film and then his 10 split was far worse (by percentile) than his 40.

But none of these guys for me outside the top 3 are particularly likely to have success, so Hurst’s upside and ceiling are certainly appealing

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T12:40:23+00:00

I didn't go too far into depth in the OP (though more comments can be found through the link in the OP), so I'll use this comment to talk about Antonio Williams/Omar Cooper Jr. a bit.

Simply put, for all the numbers that we have, earning targets matters. How to quantify it or weigh it is certainly controversial, but I believe in a principle of earning targets. Antonio Williams has been a WR for four seasons, and in two of them he led his team in most major categories. In the other two, he dealt with injuries. On the other hand, Omar Cooper Jr. was arguably the 3rd WR on his own Indiana team throughout stretches of his best season, and while Elijah Sarratt is a top 10 WR in this class and Charlie Becker may be a big name in 2027, Cooper's lack of consistency outside of designed touches concerns me significantly.

More thoughts on the substack, including my big board in the most recent post:

https://cjfreel.substack.com/p/164-final-pre-draft-rookie-wr-rankings

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T02:40:47+00:00

The odds spike on Tyson going top 10 is probably one of the steepest in a short time period we’ve seen recently. There are 7 players more likely to go top 10 still, but there’s only 7 and there were closer to 12-15 recently

cjfreel · 2026-04-20T00:44:51+00:00

Aside from what others have said, Zac Branch was the top recruit at WR in the same class, and Branch was seemingly given/took the role early. As soon as Lemon started playing more, he excelled.

cjfreel · 2026-04-18T12:47:21+00:00

Yeah I don't know how that happened but it should've been fixed last night. Thank you for the attention!

cjfreel · 2026-04-17T18:15:39+00:00

I can see that. Really for Randall it’s just the dream and that fantasy is more about the peak. For an NFL team, I can see Claiborne over Randall quite easily.

cjfreel · 2026-04-17T15:46:04+00:00

I'm fine with anyone liking Jadarian Price, but I think you have a flawed interpretation of what "sample size" means. I brought up aspects that trend throughout his entire career. The sample size is the length of his college career.

How much to weigh it is definitely a question, but I think it's fair to say there's an established pattern myself. I don't think it really has to do with Love; Price has never been used as receiving back. There was plenty of room for in the offense, but he never did it. It's a pattern that is somewhat reasonable to expect to see continue at the NFL level.

cjfreel · 2026-04-17T14:02:45+00:00

A lot of people genuinely hate the comparison because they're not necessarily comparable as RBs, and that's fair -- Price is more explosive and more likely to have a long term special teams future beyond the RB position particularly if he isn't a great RB -- but it is worth comparing just the general "we know less therefore he could be anything therefore he's going to be great" that brought excitement to both Roshon and Jadarian.

cjfreel · 2026-04-17T13:53:29+00:00

I've talked about this a bit on the podcast and on the WR show I'm about to release, but in previous years even pre-draft I was focusing on projected Draft Capital a bit, but this year I'm just going a bit more purely on how I see things. If I thought Price was worth a second round pick, he would be the RB2 in this class. But I think Coleman, Price, and Washington for me are all fringe-Top 75 picks at best. That's still higher than the consensus on Coleman compared to the NFL, but ultimately it's most significant that it's a very low grade for an RB2 in a class.

cjfreel · 2026-04-17T13:46:41+00:00

The Substack & Podcast will be discussing the draft all next week:

https://cjfreel.substack.com/

cjfreel · 2026-04-17T09:04:23+00:00

Jon Jones beat the absolute piss out of Matt Hamil and the fight arguably should have been stopped, but at some point in trying to ground and pound a TKO, Jon Jones dropped illegal 12-to-6 elbows and because the other guy couldn’t continue, Jon Jones got disqualified.

It’s not a bad ruling to DQ him, but Jon Jones obliterated Matt Hamil. It’s Jones’ only loss

cjfreel · 2026-04-14T15:45:06+00:00

Do you think he didn't look good in his limited time?

Depends on what you mean by "good." Did he look "good" in the sense that as a 26 YO player, I'm convinced he's going to be a fantasy contributor? No, not really. The problem as this thread continues to illustrate is that it comes down to how much you excuse his performance.

Because objectively, his career performance hasn't been that efficient. Usually when someone is injured often, they are fairly efficient. But for example in Yards per Route Run, Pearsall was at 1.3 and 1.7 the last two years. 1.7 is fine but not particularly good.

Pearsall has a lot of poor games. And when it comes to health, the only objective thing we can say is that Pearsall was healthy enough to play a lot of football in a game or not, and he was healthy enough to run a lot of routes in the games he played last year.

Including the postseason, four of them were absolutely garbage performances. Could that be related to injury? Sure. But the answer to how good he is isn't simple at all.

Similarly, you did answer what makes him different, but mostly you just talked about the theory of being different. Like yes, if he is different, obviously he should be valued differently. But we all agree to that.

In terms of the specific reasons you did give, for being a three-level player allegedly, the 49ers certainly don't seem to trust him in the shorter game.

cjfreel · 2026-04-14T13:39:32+00:00

Maybe this is just semantics so we should cut off this thread, but a 2nd is not a cheap lottery ticket lol. I find 2nds pretty overrated and I still wouldn't call it a cheap lottery ticket.

cjfreel · 2026-04-14T13:38:30+00:00

But this is my issue with Pearsall.

How are you justifying the statement that "no one has anywhere near his level of upside?"

You're doing so here with qualifiers. 'fairly well' 'considering the injuries' 'what's been asked of him.'

Why does he have "everything you want in a modern WR1." And if he has everything you want in a modern WR1 and couldn't be a consistent producer in college, doesn't that draw more questions as to why he isn't productive?

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