Top Lines
Big Board Prep, Egg Prices, and the Energy Transition
What I’m Writing
Answering the Patrick Mahomes Question — published Saturday
Big Board Gameplan — target publication 28 Feb
Reviewing the Macro Best Ball Environment — TBD publication date
What I’m Thinking About
Big Board Prep. I’m planning to enter the best ball waters for the first time in 2025 in the next week or so. I prompted Perplexity AI to give me a basic strategy guide and came away quite impressed, as it hit on many of the major factors and unique aspects of the Big Board and pre-NFL draft best ball. It didn’t do quite as well with my request to learn and rank the incoming rookie prospects, but it did get the first-level takeaways correct. I’ve started diving into the prospect details (as you’ll see below), and I’m excited to start drafting again soon.
What I’m Reading
Energy
The Most Hopeful Chart in the World (And its evil twin...)
Key Quote: The green transition is powered by coal… (but) None of the above should stop any of us from being techno-optimists. It’s still possible to envisage a future with lower carbon emissions. That chart at the top is still incredibly inspiring. But it also has a dark side, about which we shouldn’t delude ourselves.
My Takeaway: In the short/medium term, it’s hard to envision a pathway to the use of purely renewable energy. To put it bluntly, there’s a huge appetite for more energy, and renewables can’t scale quickly enough to meet that demand. So, we should expect that coal (and to a greater extent, natural gas) continue to be a energy sources for years to come. However, it’s also very encouraging that solar continues to greatly outpace expectations, and I remain bullish on our long-term energy transition, even if the road has bumps along the way.
Economy
Stop blaming rising egg prices on market power
Key Quote: More than 30 million chickens--roughly 10% of the nation's egg-laying population--have been killed in just the last three months to prevent disease spread…
Put differently, if the quantity supplied drops by 1%, prices will rise by about 6.67%.1 In this case, the quantity of eggs dropped around 10%, which would generate a 67% increase in prices.My Takeaway: Basically, higher egg prices are here to stay. The demand for eggs isn't going away, and with the loss of ~10% of the chickens, there's simply less available. Per the below discussion with Chat GPT, it will likely take 5-7 months to return to the normal supply of eggs in the United States.
25 Useful Ideas for 2025
Key Quote 1: As an industry's productivity increases, wages in that industry naturally rise. This forces wages--and prices--in services without increased productivity to also rise to stay competitive. Thus, as a country gets richer, goods become cheaper, but labor-intensive services like healthcare & college tuition cost more.
My Takeaway: This is in contrast to the Marc Andreeson article that’s been widely cited lately, in which he ascribes the higher prices in services vs the lower costs to material goods to “heavy regulation” and “Soviet style price setting”, with no supporting evidence presented. That might be true for a small subset, but to me, it seems much more likely the primary reason is because of the natural economic force known as the Baumol effect. In short, the Baumol effect predicts that in a rich country like the United States, material goods will become cheaper while services will become more expensive because of unequal productivity gains.2
Key Quote 2: Americans of all ages tend to believe America peaked -- morally, politically, economically, artistically -- whenever they were a kid. Perhaps people who yearn for the time when their country was great are mostly just yearning for their childhood.
My Takeaway: This hits home, as I’ve recently had nostalgia for simpler times. This quote offers the perspective that it’s normal to miss the good ole days, but that doesn’t mean things are actually worse now. For most people, life is better.
Sports
Navigating this Offseason's RB Minefield
Key Quote: The past three NFL draft classes have seen between 16 and 19 backs listed in the PFF BigBoard top 200 (a very strong predictor of how the NFL will attack the position across the entire draft). In 2025, PFF has 22 backs in their top 200.
My Takeaway: As usual, Daniel impresses with the rigorous analytic quality of his work. I'd encourage you to read it, as there's many takeaways from it, including a skill grade and investment grade for a team's current RB room, which enables us to predict which RB ADPs are most fragile. If I'm only choosing one takeaway, I'd say that for those of us drafting the Big Board, it's that we should #EmbraceUncertainty with the rookie RBs.3
2025 Rookie Draft Prospects for Best Ball
Key Quote: With best ball drafting already underway, it is time for everyone to get acquainted with the upcoming rookie class. All draft-relevant rookies are in our rankings, but it is often helpful to have a quick reference guide to familiarize yourself with each player.
My Takeaway: So far, my stance on this class is: RB is deep and good throughout. WR is middling, without a clearly elite prospect. TE is a good class, but probably no Brock Bowers or Sam Laporta. QB seems to be a middling class, with even the top guys likely struggling early in their careers. Still, each of the top four has at least some mobility, which remains a huge advantage in both the real NFL and in fantasy football.
5 Undervalued Rookie WRs Are Currently Available in the Back Half of Underdog Drafts
Key Quote: If Travis Hunter were to become a full-time WR in the NFL, he would deserve a spot with Tetairoa McMillan and Luther Burden III somewhere in Round 5 or Round 6 of Underdog drafts. But with the most likely NFL outcome seeing him primarily play cornerback and moonlight at WR, a couple of useable weeks will not be worth a selection at the beginning of the 12th round.
My Takeaway: As usual, the Rotoviz crew is hitting early and often on the WR prospect analysis. However, while I understand the reticence to draft Travis Hunter if he primarily plays CB, I tend to think a few useable weeks is a perfectly fine downside scenario for a 12th round pick. And, as Kevin details, the upside scenarios are sky high. In a top-heavy tournament where ADP volatility is the norm, I want to be more risk-seeking than normal, and Hunter fits that bill.
Youth at RB and TE Could Produce Some Potential Sleepers in the Upcoming Draft: 2025 NFL Draft Prospect Age Database
Key Quote: Age continues to be an important factor when evaluating NFL draft prospects. As a rule of thumb: the younger a player is when he enters the league, the better. This year’s crop of rookies includes some young prospects who could rise above their projected draft capital, particularly at running back and tight end... The elevated NFL success of RBs who finish their college careers at age 20 is nothing to be scoffed at. The 2025 draft will feature six such players, the youngest of whom is Tennessee star Dylan Sampson.
My Takeaway: This reinforced the ETR article on the relative strength of this RB and TE class. For those of you in dynasty leagues, it's probably worth trying to move some of your mid-tier RBs and TEs for other assets more likely to increase in value. For the Big Board, I want to break ties in favor of the younger prospects.
Other Topics
The Case for Reading Fiction
Key Quote: Fiction is also better for enhancing empathy than watching TV and movies. Across 70 experiments, novels did more to boost concern for and understanding of others.
My Takeaway: Read fiction — not just because it's fun, but to improve your own emotional and social skills.
OpenAI, Part 2
Key Quote: A new and improved version of search is good, but not life-changing. If you have agents who can complete tasks, schedule vacations, book hotels, respond to emails, handle customer service requests, can schedule calendar invites, that's life-changing! Are we there today? No. Are we there next year? Maybe. Are we there a decade from now? Definitely.
My Takeaway: Imagining a world where an AI assistant could book vacations for you, or respond to basic emails to schedule appointments on your behalf is certainly fun. But similar to last week with the Sam Altman article, it’s the speed at which AI experts are predicting these changes that jumps out to me. “Definitely” within a decade.
Book Update
In Progress:
My goal is to read 3 books at once: 1 non-fiction, 1 fiction, and one self-improvement.4
The 5 Types of Wealth — 10%
The Back Mechanic — 35%
Per this paper: Egg Prices and Avian Influenza - A Deep Dive
To quote Baumol, “If productivity per man hour rises cumulatively in one sector relative to its rate of growth elsewhere in the economy, while wages rise commensurately in all areas, then relative costs in the nonprogressive sectors must inevitably rise, and these costs will rise cumulatively and without limit...Thus, the very progress of the technologically progressive sectors inevitably adds to the costs of the technologically unchanging sectors of the economy, unless somehow the labor markets in these areas can be sealed off and wages held absolutely constant, a most unlikely possibility.”
I will likely use the LegUp rankings for my initial Big Board draft run. For my money, Pat and crew are the best in the industry at prospect analysis, which is certainly the biggest hole in my pre-NFL draft best ball game.
Though, I allow myself flexibility if something else catches my eye.