Prepping for the season cont. (Coaching Changes part 1AFC)

Every year there's a handful of coaching changes or promotions that take place around the league and yes they absolutely influence how you should value the players in their respective schemes. Perfect example: Last year at this time everyone was expecting a breakout season from OJ Howard. He was ranked by most experts in the top 10 even Top 5 TEs with ADP to match. There was only one problem. Arians was the new head coach and if you know Arians you know his offensive scheme is very unfriendly to TEs. OJ was a huge bust but if you took that into account you would have avoided that situation. Now this dosent always happen. Sometimes coaches tweak their schemes to fit the particular talent on their team. Sometimes not so much. Let's go through some of the changes and see what they might mean for the players they will be coaching. 

Chan Gailey (Miami): No Chan and Ryan didn't go back to Buffalo. That's a picture from when these two were together and produced Fitzpatrick's best season of his career. Now they are reunited in Miami and the system will be familiar to Ryan and in this Covid19 situation that's a big deal. That system also has a few tendencies. Spread formations slightly higher pass to run ratio and a tendency to throw to RBs. (That last part is what we're looking for) Jordan Howard and Matt Breida are the starting backs and Howard doesn't catch many passes so if Breida can stay healthy he's a solid value at his current ADP especially in PPR leagues. It's also WR friendly scheme so Davante Parker and Preston Wilson should continue their breakout into this season. As for the TE position it's kind of hard to tell. His TE target shares are horrifically low which would scream "Don't draft Gesicki" but in all those years his best TE was Scott Chandler. His one year with Tony Gonzalez saw a 33% target share. So it all depends on how he views Gesicki.

Kevin Stefanski (Cleveland): Brings his run heavy and efficient passing scheme over from Minnesota. Not only that but they sured up their OL by drafting Wills in the first round and signing Jack Conklin over from the Titans. These are all good signs for Cleveland's playmakers on offense. I expect a rebound season for Baker especially due to easier passes and a better overall concept on offense. Chubb should enjoy a good season as well but with Hunt there taking touches away and his dreadful numbers inside the 5 yardline last season I'm not drafting him at his mid-late first round ADP. Hunt on the other hand is an incredible value especially in PPR formats. 

Jay Gruden (Jacksonville): Jay Gruden slides back into the OC role after a rough go at becoming an HC in Washington. All faults aside Jay was always good with QBs. He led Andy Dalton to his best seasons and helped him grow as a young QB every year they were together. After Jay left for Washington Dalton never reached that level of play again. Now he gets Gardner Minshew as his student and I think it's going to be a match made in FL heaven. Gruden's laid back and calm demeanor should give the easily excitable Minshew some stability. Minshew is a beautiful option for #lateroundqb draft strategies (which should be everyone's strategy). As for Fournette I think he loses at least some.of his passing game work to Chris Thompson since Gruden probably had a hand in bringing him over. That's more of a concern for Fournette's value than an endorsement for Thompson just to be clear. I'm not excited about either one but Fournette can return on RB2 value. I think less receptions and more TDs than last season so similar point total by years end if you play in a standard league sounds great but nobody plays standard anymore. The main beneficiaries of this is Minshew and Chark to a lesser extent. 

Pat Shurmur (Denver): Shurmur takes his QB coach with him to Denver where he will serve as the OC and be in charge of Drew Lock's development. Shurmur has had varying degrees of success learning mostly from offensive mastermind Andy Reid. One thing that's certain is that Shurmur likes to put the ball in the hands of his QB. All his offenses are usually pretty pass heavy. This means more volume for guys like Sutton and Jeudy. Shurmur also likes to use the TE in his passing attack and he's got a nice pass-catching TE in Noah Fant who's primed for a breakout. Only problem is this being a Fangio run team he likes to run the ball and play defense. It's going to be interesting to see how this shakes out and how tight the leash will be on Shurmur and the young QB. Will Fangio sacrifice his teams concept to develop Lock? I personally think he will until it doesn't work then you may see sparks fly on the sidelines between Pat and Vic. 🍿