Each year after the NFL draft is complete, more than 20 men and women, including fantasy writers and editors, NFL writers, researchers and other members of the football operation here at ESPN, spend two full days talking about the game and what to expect in the season ahead. Many topics are discussed from various angles, including the utilization of metrics, film study, fantasy strategy, intel gathered from team sources and much more.
When all is said and done, we emerge with a set of rankings from the group in the room. These are those rankings, and they are for PPR (point-per-reception) scoring formats.
To be clear, they are not to be confused with our ESPN Fantasy staff rankings — a composite of our five season-long PPR analysts, Matthew Berry, Mike Clay, Tristan H. Cockcroft, Eric Karabell and Field Yates — which are also available on ESPN.com and updated all the way up to kickoff of the opener in September.
Detroit Lions owner Martha Ford, team president Rod Wood and general manager Bob Quinn released a joint statement late Wednesday expressing support for head coach Matt Patricia after a sexual assault charge against him from 22 years ago resurfaced in a Detroit News story.
Patricia, in an accompanying statement, denied the accusation, made by a woman while Patricia was a student at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute on spring break in South Padre Island, Texas, in 1996.
“As someone who was falsely accused of this very serious charge over 22 years ago, and never given the opportunity to defend myself and clear my name, I find it incredibly unfair, disappointing, and frustrating that this story would resurface now with the only purpose being to damage my character and reputation,” Patricia said in the statement. “I firmly maintain my innocence, as I have always done. I would never condone any of the behavior that was alleged and will always respect and protect the rights of anyone who has been harassed or is the victim of violence.
“My priorities remain the same — to move forward and strive to be the best coach, teacher, and man that I can possibly be.”
The joint statement from the team’s leadership read, in part, that the charge against Patricia “was dismissed by the prosecutor at the request of the complaining individual prior to trial. As a result, Coach Patricia never had the opportunity to present his case or clear his name publicly in a court of law. He has denied that there was any factual basis for the charge. There was no settlement agreement with the complaining individual, no money exchanged hands and there was no confidentiality agreement. In discussions today with Lions management, the reporter involved acknowledged that the allegations have not been substantiated.
“As an organization, the Detroit Lions take allegations regarding sexual assault or harassment seriously. Coach Patricia was the subject of a standard pre-employment background check which did not disclose this issue. We have spoken to Coach Patricia about this at length as well as the attorney who represented him at the time. Based upon everything we have learned, we believe and have accepted Coach Patricia’s explanation and we will continue to support him. We will continue to work with our players and the NFL to further awareness of and protections for those individuals who are the victims of sexual assault or violence.”
Charges were filed in the case, and Patricia and his friend, Greg Dietrich, were indicted by a grand jury of one count of aggravated sexual assault, but they were never tried in the case.
Wood told the Detroit News that he and Quinn were not aware of the allegation in Patricia’s past when they hired him. Wood later told the newspaper that he was “comfortable” with Patricia on staff.
“I am very comfortable with the process of interviewing and employing Matt,” Wood told the News. “I will tell you with 1,000 percent certainty that everything I’ve learned confirmed what I already knew about the man and would have no way changed our decision to make him our head coach.”
The News reported that APG Security, a private investigation firm with corporate headquarters in South Amboy, New Jersey, and offices in 21 states including Texas, requested the court files for Patricia’s case in January. It is not clear whether the Lions contracted the firm to run a background check on Patricia or someone else did.
The News reported that the case against Patricia and Dietrich fell apart when the alleged victim did not respond to attempts to contact her in the weeks following the incident and decided she would not testify.
As of Wednesday night, Patricia, 43, was scheduled to talk with the media Thursday before the Lions open their rookie minicamp this weekend.
METAIRIE, La. — Here’s the bright side: If any team is equipped to handle a No. 1 running back getting hit with a four-game suspension, it’s the New Orleans Saints, who have two No. 1 running backs.
Alvin Kamara won’t have Mark Ingram to celebrate with early in the season, but Kamara should be fine as a workhorse running back. Jonathan Bachman/Getty Images
Of course, Mark Ingram’s suspension for violating the NFL policy on performance-enhancing substances is not an ideal scenario for the Saints, who loved their one-two punch of Ingram and Kamara last season. New Orleans mixed the two almost interchangeably in the run game, passing game and short-yardage game.
They became the first duo in NFL history to each surpass 1,500 yards from scrimmage in a season, with both of them scoring at least 12 touchdowns and making the Pro Bowl. They were a huge reason the Saints boasted the No. 2-ranked offense and led the league in rushing touchdowns and yards per rush.
But Kamara sure looks like a guy who can handle being both 1A and 1B while Ingram is sidelined for the first four weeks of the 2018 season. The NFL’s reigning Offensive Rookie of the Year showed he could do a little bit of everything last season, as he racked up 728 rushing yards, 826 receiving yards and 14 total touchdowns.
Even the Saints admitted that Kamara was a better between-the-tackles runner than they expected while he averaged a whopping 6.1 yards per carry. By the end of the season, Kamara began to take on slightly more of the workload than Ingram.
We discussed those evolving roles at last week’s ESPN Fantasy Football rankings summit, where we collectively ranked Kamara sixth among running backs and Ingram 14th.
Obviously, they’ll be heading in two different directions on that list now. The bigger question is whether the disparity will become permanent.
Ingram’s suspension comes at a critical time in his career. Not only is he trying to prove he can still run step for step with the NFL’s newest superstar running back, but he is also heading into the final year of his contract.
The NFL Network reported that Ingram has not been participating in the Saints’ offseason conditioning program so far. Earlier this offseason, he switched from longtime agent Joel Segal to new agents Paul Bobbitt and David Jones. It’s unclear whether that means Ingram is angling for a lucrative contract extension before the season kicks off. If so, this suspension won’t help his case.
I certainly don’t expect Ingram to wind up in the Saints’ ‘doghouse.’ The former Heisman Trophy winner and first-round draft pick has been widely respected by teammates and coaches throughout his seven-year career in New Orleans, especially for the way he handled his smaller role in a crowded timeshare when things weren’t going great early in his career.
But even a guy as beloved as Ingram might feel like a luxury item if Kamara proves that he can be a true leading man in Ingram’s absence. One way or another, this suspension is a huge letdown at this stage of Ingram’s career after he had worked long and hard to establish himself as one of the NFL’s best running backs following early struggles.
Ingram, 28, needs just 735 rushing yards and five rushing touchdowns to break Deuce McAllister’s franchise records of 6,096 and 49 — something that seemed like a no-brainer before the suspension. Ingram could still pull off both feats in 12 games if he stays as hot as he was last season, when he ran for a career-best 1,124 yards and 12 TDs.
It’s hard to imagine any of those players being a significant fantasy investment unless one emerges as the clear backup in the preseason. Scott seems to have the most upside of the bunch, especially if you’re taking a long-term flier on him. It’s hard to predict how many No. 1 backs the Saints will have on the roster in 2019.
The NFL Players Association on Monday filed two claims on behalf of former San Francisco 49ers safety Eric Reid, a 26-year-old unsigned free agent who believes that teams are refusing to sign him because he has protested during pregame national anthem ceremonies.
The actions taken by the NFL players’ union Monday are separate from the collusion grievance Reid and his attorney Mark Geragos filed against the NFL last week.
Former 49ers safety Eric Reid, left, filed a collusion grievance against the NFL in early May. His claims are similar to those in former teammate Colin Kaepernick’s collusion grievance against the league. Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images
Monday’s filings by the NFLPA included a noninjury grievance specific to Reid’s free-agent visits and a more general “system arbitrator case” alleging that any team that asks prospective signees whether they plan to protest during the anthem is engaged in bad-faith negotiation.
“Prior to the start of the current NFL off-season, our Union directed the agents of free agent players who had participated in peaceful on-field demonstrations to collect, memorialize and report any relevant information about potential violations of the Collective Bargaining Agreement by teams,” the NFLPA said in a statement announcing the claims Monday.
The union’s statement lists five bullet points as justification for the claims:
• “There is no League rule that prohibits players from demonstrating during the national anthem.”
• “The NFL has made it clear both publicly and to the NFLPA that they would respect the rights of players to demonstrate.”
• “The Collective Bargaining Agreement definitively states that the League (NFL) rules supersede any conflicting club rules.”
• “According to our information, a club appears to have based its decision not to sign a player based on the player’s statement that he would challenge the implementation of a club’s policy prohibiting demonstration, which is contrary to the League policy.”
• “At least one club owner has asked pre-employment interview questions about a player’s intent to demonstrate. We believe these questions are improper, given League policy.”
Reid filed his collusion grievance last week with the aid of Geragos, the same attorney Kaepernick is using in his own collusion grievance against the league. Monday’s union filings, however, are separate.
The noninjury grievance the union filed Monday is based on the union’s belief that individual club anthem policies violate the collective bargaining agreement, which doesn’t specifically grant teams the right to create their own policies, while the league’s states only that players “should” stand for the anthem. Based on information the union has obtained regarding Reid’s free-agent visits, an NFLPA source said Monday, the NFLPA believes the Bengals told Reid they were planning to implement a policy requiring players to stand for the anthem.
The system arbitrator case that the union filed Monday is a broader claim intended to establish a precedent for all players and against all clubs moving forward. This one doesn’t address the idea of individual team policies on the anthem as much as the idea of what questions are and aren’t appropriate to ask prospective employees in interviews.
