fantasy football

this might be slightly off topic, but can you go into a little more detail on how you run simulations?

I just got back into watching the NFL last season, which happened to be when the 49ers were finally playing good again.

With school + watching MMA + watching tennis + watching NHL (season starts on October 1st), I won't be able to watch a lot of NFL this season, but I will watch every 49ers game and as much of the Raiders games as I can before I get sick of seeing the Raiders lose. Anyway, if you make any type of NFL thread, I'll participate for sure, especially since I will be betting on NFL matches every week.

On September 02 2013 23:58 Bigbobm wrote: this might be slightly off topic, but can you go into a little more detail on how you run simulations?

pretty on topic, teach a man to fish...

its a few step process. first find projections you really trust. making them yourself is too much work, but there are some really bad projections out there and some really good ones. I personally like David Dodds over at footballyguys the best. He has a really good track record the last few years and I overall trust his projections a lot. Not to say I dont disagree with some stuff, i.e. he undervalues marshawn lynch and a few other players and has some slight biases but is overall the best guy i know of.

The next step is to work up a VBD list. Suppose you are in a 10 man 1 qb/2 rb/3 WR/ no flex league. There are a few different ways to come up with a baseline player at each position, but here is the easiest for running back: There are 10 teams and each team starts 2 running backs. So there are always going to be at least 20 running backs drafted + backups for bye weeks. So a baseline player will be a running back in the 21-40 range. Using #25 is fine. then the VBD of the #1 RB Adrian Peterson is his projected total points minus the projected total points of RB25. so for mine AP is projected to score 263.2, RB25 (deangelo williams) is projected 142.5 so AP's VBD is 120.7 This makes him the most valuable player in the league as the top players at the other positions have lower VBD numbers. come up with a list of players ranked by VBD and thats about where you should draft them.

you can make this list yourself or you can use an already made spreadsheet or program. Footballguys (http://www.footballguys.com/) and a ton of other sites have a lot of tools that cut down on the work on these first few steps and allow you to spend much more time on the next step.

The rest is somewhat trial and error and is based a lot off of experience. for example in my VBD list for 10 man 1 qb/ 2rb/3WR/te no PPR leagues, i have vincent jackson ranked #24 overall and roughly equal to both andre johnson and larry fitzgerald. But from experience I know that vincent jackson has a higher average draft position and often goes later around pick 36. so suppose I have the #27 pick and am deciding between taking a WR or a running back. Im often going to take a running back here that might have a slightly lower VBD like reggie bush or frank gore but goes earlier with an ADP of #28 because I wont be able to get him next time around but I will be able to get Vjax at pick #34 often.

so basically I go through the lists of both the site im drafting on and my own list, and try and figure out what players I would draft in each round and play around with different positional draft orders and try to maximize my points. in a 1 qb/2 rb/3wr/te type league, i generally try to maximize the following function: suppose QB1 = points that my QB1 scores etc. my function would be QB1+RB1+RB2+.7*RB3+WR1+WR2+WR3+.8WR4+TE. so i run through different draft orders such as WR/WR/RB/WR/RB/QB/RB/TE/WR vs RB/RB/WR/WR/QB/TE/RB/WR/WR, and see what ordering gives me the highest number.

its quite a bit of work but in the end you get a much cleaner idea of what your goals are in each round of a draft

On September 03 2013 00:09 PuertoRican wrote: I just got back into watching the NFL last season, which happened to be when the 49ers were finally playing good again. With school + watching MMA + watching tennis + watching NHL (season starts on October 1st), I won't be able to watch a lot of NFL this season, but I will watch every 49ers game and as much of the Raiders games as I can before I get sick of seeing the Raiders lose. Anyway, if you make any type of NFL thread, I'll participate for sure, especially since I will be betting on NFL matches every week.

i envy this. im a jets fan and since the team is so awful (we are as bad as the raiders) i have resorted to fantasy football for all my football sweating this season. it sucks to not have a team that I can really root for this year, but at least I have a player on almost every team that I can hope scores me points

What's the stakes/#entrants/payout structure for these things?

If anyone's looking for a free site, http://fftoolbox.com/ allows you to type in your league scoring settings and get customized cheat sheets. There's another site that ranked the performance of a ton of fantasy football experts/sites for the last few years, and fftoolbox was first last year and like top 3 overall. It was incredibly useful this year since my league commissioner decided to make our league 0.5 PPR, 0.02 return yardage, and other shenanigans to keep people from being able to use standard guides. Sadly, in 6 years I've never done better than 5th, but yahoo projects me to own the hell out of everyone this year, and that was *before* Andre Brown got hurt. Pick 36 David Wilson hell yeah. Workhorse RB1 and the kick returner? That's not even fair.

I'm a Falcons fan so I'm pretty happy on the real football part too. Sorry about the Jets.

On September 03 2013 00:13 Daut wrote: The rest is somewhat trial and error and is based a lot off of experience. for example in my VBD list for 10 man 1 qb/ 2rb/3WR/te no PPR leagues, i have vincent jackson ranked #24 overall and roughly equal to both andre johnson and larry fitzgerald. But from experience I know that vincent jackson has a higher average draft position and often goes later around pick 36. so suppose I have the #27 pick and am deciding between taking a WR or a running back. Im often going to take a running back here that might have a slightly lower VBD like reggie bush or frank gore but goes earlier with an ADP of #28 because I wont be able to get him next time around but I will be able to get Vjax at pick #34 often. so basically I go through the lists of both the site im drafting on and my own list, and try and figure out what players I would draft in each round and play around with different positional draft orders and try to maximize my points. in a 1 qb/2 rb/3wr/te type league, i generally try to maximize the following function: suppose QB1 = points that my QB1 scores etc. my function would be QB1+RB1+RB2+.7*RB3+WR1+WR2+WR3+.8WR4+TE. so i run through different draft orders such as WR/WR/RB/WR/RB/QB/RB/TE/WR vs RB/RB/WR/WR/QB/TE/RB/WR/WR, and see what ordering gives me the highest number. its quite a bit of work but in the end you get a much cleaner idea of what your goals are in each round of a draft

First; I'm not entirely sure what fantasy football is... but couldn't you write a computer program to try all the likely possible combinations and optimize it for you? sure its kinda NP-hard but a computer could whip through this problem overnight, for all reasonable teams for a given projection, returning the best team and adjustments for each draft round.

I know nothing about fantasy football, but a bit more about optimization. If you can list the total combinations you want to assess, and if you only have one variable to maximize, you won't need a night to calculate which is (or are) the best solution(s), and you won't even need an optimization algorithm.

I see you have played for more than one year, and you seem to have some way to weight the function you want to maximize, could not you try to evaluate what are the best coefficients based on the data you had for the previous years ?

It seems that you have various possibilities of choosing orders (as the two you listed), could you analyse what is the sensibility of your function to the order you choose ? (for example, picking the QB last would put you at risk...)

I am not saying you should do that, just saying it seems it could be done and may be interesting. But I may have misunderstood the thing as I know nothing about football and even less about fantasy football.

ok so i'm pretty tired and not sure what to ask you specifically but i'll just give you some general info and you can respond to whatever....

our league is a 10 team 1 QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, 1 TE, no flex, non PPR league

i basically have 2 teams in the same league and drafted positions #8 and #9

for the #8 pick i drafted

Manning 1st rd, Alfred Morris 2nd rd, Andre Johnson 3rd, Victor Cruz 4th rd, Mike Wallace 5th rd (really regret this pick), Ryan Matthews 6th rd, Antonio Gates 7th rd, Eddie Lacy 8th rd (would like to hear your overall thoughts/projection for him), Andy Dalton 9th rd, St Louis D 10th rd, Jermaine Gresham 11th rd, Greg Zuerlein 12th rd, Kendall Wright 13th rd, Knowshon Moreno 14th rd, Matt Schaub 15th rd, and Jacoby Jones 16th

for the #9 pick

Drew Brees 1st, LeSean McCoy 2nd, Larry Fitz 3rd, Jimmy Graham 4th, Steve Smith 5th, David Wilson 6th, Miles Austin 7th, Giovani Bernard 8th, Russel Wilson 9th, Cincinnati D 10th, Lance Moore 11th, Justin Tucker 12th, Denarious Moore 13th, Kyle Rudolph 14th, Rueben Randle 15th, and Carson Palmer 16th

also while i was picking these teams with a friend apparently Calvin Johnson was available in the 2nd round but i was told he had already been picked by said friend so I went RB for both teams. if you had to pick between Calvin, McCoy, and Morris who would you go with? i suppose it might be different seeing as how we both went QB in the 1st rd instead of RB and might've made more sense if we both already had a solid RB

i can send you a copy of our entire draft if you'd like to see. anyway fantasy football is really just something i do for fun and i'm probably a pretty huge fish but i'd like to improve and become better at it.

thanks for doing this. i find your projections very interesting

On September 03 2013 01:36 b97531 wrote: What's the stakes/#entrants/payout structure for these things?

most of them are $250-$400 buyins this year with 10-12 players. instead of doing big buyins this year i did a bunch of medium sized ones and am going to fire next year.

On September 03 2013 01:48 ShadowDrgn wrote: If anyone's looking for a free site, http://fftoolbox.com/ allows you to type in your league scoring settings and get customized cheat sheets. There's another site that ranked the performance of a ton of fantasy football experts/sites for the last few years, and fftoolbox was first last year and like top 3 overall. It was incredibly useful this year since my league commissioner decided to make our league 0.5 PPR, 0.02 return yardage, and other shenanigans to keep people from being able to use standard guides. Sadly, in 6 years I've never done better than 5th, but yahoo projects me to own the hell out of everyone this year, and that was *before* Andre Brown got hurt. Pick 36 David Wilson hell yeah. Workhorse RB1 and the kick returner? That's not even fair. I'm a Falcons fan so I'm pretty happy on the real football part too. Sorry about the Jets.

ive used fftoolbox before and i think it has the right idea but executes poorly. their projections seem a bit absurd and their VBD values are quite a bit off, but it definitely has the right idea about how to try and rank players based on league settings. use the site to get an idea of where certain player groups are supposed to go but then adjust player by player based on your own or better projections

On September 03 2013 04:03 Silver_nz wrote: Show nested quote + On September 03 2013 00:13 Daut wrote: The rest is somewhat trial and error and is based a lot off of experience. for example in my VBD list for 10 man 1 qb/ 2rb/3WR/te no PPR leagues, i have vincent jackson ranked #24 overall and roughly equal to both andre johnson and larry fitzgerald. But from experience I know that vincent jackson has a higher average draft position and often goes later around pick 36. so suppose I have the #27 pick and am deciding between taking a WR or a running back. Im often going to take a running back here that might have a slightly lower VBD like reggie bush or frank gore but goes earlier with an ADP of #28 because I wont be able to get him next time around but I will be able to get Vjax at pick #34 often. so basically I go through the lists of both the site im drafting on and my own list, and try and figure out what players I would draft in each round and play around with different positional draft orders and try to maximize my points. in a 1 qb/2 rb/3wr/te type league, i generally try to maximize the following function: suppose QB1 = points that my QB1 scores etc. my function would be QB1+RB1+RB2+.7*RB3+WR1+WR2+WR3+.8WR4+TE. so i run through different draft orders such as WR/WR/RB/WR/RB/QB/RB/TE/WR vs RB/RB/WR/WR/QB/TE/RB/WR/WR, and see what ordering gives me the highest number. its quite a bit of work but in the end you get a much cleaner idea of what your goals are in each round of a draft First; I'm not entirely sure what fantasy football is... but couldn't you write a computer program to try all the likely possible combinations and optimize it for you? sure its kinda NP-hard but a computer could whip through this problem overnight, for all reasonable teams for a given projection, returning the best team and adjustments for each draft round.

yes, i probably could write a program to do it and ill probably do that next year. but there are a lot of human elements to the draft that are somewhat tough to program. for instance QB fly off the board way faster than they should based on their VBD and you kinda have to pay attention to the inflection points and choose the best valued guy. in this specific year there are the top 12 guys that are bunched up somewhat close together then a medium sized gap to #13 (dalton) then another medium sized gap to the rest. so in these 10-12 team leagues its usually best to wait til only a couple QB are left from the top 12 group and then grab one as late as you can.

using a computer program like that is real nice predraft and would optimize a list based on ADP for me, but during the draft it would be pretty difficult to have one that is constantly re-running all the different lineups and telling you which position to draft in each round based on who has been taken already since so many different guys get reached on. so besides the time id have to spend implementing it, i just decided to do it by hand this year.

On September 03 2013 06:04 kingpowa wrote: I know nothing about fantasy football, but a bit more about optimization. If you can list the total combinations you want to assess, and if you only have one variable to maximize, you won't need a night to calculate which is (or are) the best solution(s), and you won't even need an optimization algorithm. I see you have played for more than one year, and you seem to have some way to weight the function you want to maximize, could not you try to evaluate what are the best coefficients based on the data you had for the previous years ? It seems that you have various possibilities of choosing orders (as the two you listed), could you analyse what is the sensibility of your function to the order you choose ? (for example, picking the QB last would put you at risk...) I am not saying you should do that, just saying it seems it could be done and may be interesting. But I may have misunderstood the thing as I know nothing about football and even less about fantasy football.

addressed this in the previous post but yes, this would be a nice predraft tool. the issue is that so many of your human opponents go off in random directions during the draft and you can often make a better plan on the fly than you did predraft, so during a draft id need to have a really clean and fast program that can re-run itself and evaluate what the best course of action is given who has been taken and it would take a lot of time to write something like that. after this season ill probably invest some time into doing just that, sounds like a fun idea.

On September 03 2013 06:46 TimDawg wrote: ok so i'm pretty tired and not sure what to ask you specifically but i'll just give you some general info and you can respond to whatever.... our league is a 10 team 1 QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, 1 TE, no flex, non PPR league i basically have 2 teams in the same league and drafted positions #8 and #9 for the #8 pick i drafted Manning 1st rd, Alfred Morris 2nd rd, Andre Johnson 3rd, Victor Cruz 4th rd, Mike Wallace 5th rd (really regret this pick), Ryan Matthews 6th rd, Antonio Gates 7th rd, Eddie Lacy 8th rd (would like to hear your overall thoughts/projection for him), Andy Dalton 9th rd, St Louis D 10th rd, Jermaine Gresham 11th rd, Greg Zuerlein 12th rd, Kendall Wright 13th rd, Knowshon Moreno 14th rd, Matt Schaub 15th rd, and Jacoby Jones 16th for the #9 pick Drew Brees 1st, LeSean McCoy 2nd, Larry Fitz 3rd, Jimmy Graham 4th, Steve Smith 5th, David Wilson 6th, Miles Austin 7th, Giovani Bernard 8th, Russel Wilson 9th, Cincinnati D 10th, Lance Moore 11th, Justin Tucker 12th, Denarious Moore 13th, Kyle Rudolph 14th, Rueben Randle 15th, and Carson Palmer 16th also while i was picking these teams with a friend apparently Calvin Johnson was available in the 2nd round but i was told he had already been picked by said friend so I went RB for both teams. if you had to pick between Calvin, McCoy, and Morris who would you go with? i suppose it might be different seeing as how we both went QB in the 1st rd instead of RB and might've made more sense if we both already had a solid RB i can send you a copy of our entire draft if you'd like to see. anyway fantasy football is really just something i do for fun and i'm probably a pretty huge fish but i'd like to improve and become better at it. thanks for doing this. i find your projections very interesting

going a QB first in 10 team leagues is generally a pretty big mistake. for instance, i have brees projected to score 325.9 points in this type of league. you took him 9th overall, but you can usually get someone like tony romo who i have projected to score 287 points overall in the 8th-9th round. since there are 12 nice QB (and vick isnt too bad as a backup this year since he has high upside) and its a 10 team league you can wait quite a long time and grab the 9th-12th QB much later. so by taking romo instead of brees you give up 39 points at that position. but what do you gain? well in this case you went qb-rb-wr. imagine if we took calvin in the first instead. i have the difference between calvin and fitz as 223.4 to 170.8 for a 53 point difference and thats just in players that get drafted 2 rounds apart. so basically the dropoff at WR/RB happens VERY fast at the beginning while QB is very slow so you should usually wait on QB and not wait on WR/RB.

the highest number of my drafts this year were this exact setup and i learned some pretty interesting things about these leagues. ok first off here are david dodds top 20 VBD ranked players for this type of league in order (i move trent down slightly and marshawn up slightly but the rest are fine): AP, martin, calvin johnson, trent, spiller, charles, mccoy, rice, morris, foster, lynch, dez bryant, aj green, forte, demaryius, jimmy graham, julio, chris johnson, david wilson, brandon marshall. so in the top 20 there are 6 wide receivers, 13 running backs, 1 tight end and 0 QB. so most people tend to go RB-RB or RB-WR. but i actually think its a mistake.

i really like trying to go WR-WR or WR-graham in this setup. the reason is that the 3rd/4th/6th/8th rounds are often dead zones where the receivers you want to draft are either gone already or are further down an average draft position list that you should wait on them. this basically means that the 3rd/4th/6th/8th rounds are great for taking RB/QB. so with the #8 pick for instance, i would often go calvin-aj green, and then my followup picks would be something along the lines of: reggie bush 3rd, vincent jackson 4th, lamar miller 5th, darren mcfadden 6th, rg3 7th, deangelo williams 8th, jermichael finley 9th, josh gordon 10th, and then fill in afterwards. so you go WR-WR and after 10 rounds you end up with 4 WR, 4 RB a TE and RG3. it works out very very well this way.

but more on your specific draft orders:

HATE brees in first. mccoy in 2nd is great, would have preferred calvin but both are GREAT value there. fitz in 3rd is great. jimmy graham in 4th is absolutely nuts. hes heads and shoulders above all other TE this year at the point you drafted and should go in the 2nd round. gronk's projections have gone up since hes only expected to miss 2 games now instead of 3-6 but at the time you drafted graham should have been taken way earlier. steve smith 5th is fine, david wilson 6th is incredible now that andre brown is out. before you got him 1 round later than he should have gone. now he should go in the late 2nd or early 3rd, huge value there. miles austin 7th is technically very good value but you can often get him in the 8th or 9th even, its crazy. bernard in the 8th is good. wilson in 9th is unnecessary since you have brees.

imagine if you passed on brees and took calvin in the first and your team was calvin/mccoy/fitz/graham/steve smith/wilson/miles/bernard/russell. youd have 3 starting RB, a top 12 QB, the best TE and 4 top 25 receivers including the by far #1. this would be just about the best team you could ever want. this pick of russell wilson in the 9th really highlights the mistake of taking brees in the first. dont take a defense that early, you can do a committee defense in the 14th round taking either new england (first choice with 3 easy games early), tampa bay (play jets week 1), st louis (play cardinals week 1) or if all those fail you can get the colts off the waiver wire (play raiders week 1).

for the #8 pick i drafted Manning 1st rd, Alfred Morris 2nd rd, Andre Johnson 3rd, Victor Cruz 4th rd, Mike Wallace 5th rd (really regret this pick), Ryan Matthews 6th rd, Antonio Gates 7th rd, Eddie Lacy 8th rd (would like to hear your overall thoughts/projection for him), Andy Dalton 9th rd, St Louis D 10th rd, Jermaine Gresham 11th rd, Greg Zuerlein 12th rd, Kendall Wright 13th rd, Knowshon Moreno 14th rd, Matt Schaub 15th rd, and Jacoby Jones 16th

hate manning. morris good value. andre supposed to go there, same with victor. i personally have a hatred for mike wallace since he puts up so many bad games and is inconsistent, but maybe this year he will go back to being a consistent killer. he really is a tremendous athlete, but i think you got him slightly too early.

ok im making this a new paragraph because i fucking love ryan mathews and im waiting for him to blowup. i seriously think that ryan mathews is a better running back than arian foster. he has great vision, hes big, strong, moves well, catches passes, has good instincts for avoiding tackles, i just think the guy is a top 12 talent at RB. for fucks sake he was a top 8 pick last year and a shoulder injury bumped him down this far? i dont get it. one of these years the guy is going to break out HUGE. being injury prone sucks, but his injuries are not things that youd expect from an injury prone person. id expect a nagging groin injury, knee problems, turf toe, broken hands, things like that. this mother fucker breaks his clavicle. thats just bad luck imo. i think hes likely to have a big year this year, especially with a new coach not named norv turner handing the ball off to shitty running backs like ronnie brown every other play.

gates is too early, you can get him in the 11th or 12th and there are better TE out there. i rank graham, gronk, witten, vernon, tony gonzalez, finley ahead of him for sure, and have him somewhere in the olsen/cook/rudolph/cameron/fred davis group. i do think gates is better than his ADP but you could have waited a round or two on him and taken an RB or WR there. eddie lacy in the 8th is incredible. he should be going in the 4th. i dont care about the picture where he looked fat, i think hes gonna be around the 20th best RB this year. sounds like a very good player. no need to draft a 2nd TE, defense or kicker that early. defense/kicker should be reserved for last 2 rounds unless you take seattle or san fran. every other defense you can wait on. kicker doesnt matter at all, you can just pick any credible one off the waiver wire and theyre almost just as likely to have the same game as other guys.

I'm in a 12 man, 300$ league
QB, 2RB, 2WR, TE, Flex, D, Kicker

QB: Tony Romo
RB: Ray Rice, Lamar Miller
WR: Dez Bryant
WR: Jordy Nelson
TE: Fred Davis
Flex: Daryl Richardson
D: Bucs ( They play your jets week 1) I usually just pick up defenses every week that play against teh worst teams in the league
Kicker : Kai Forsath ( Redskins)

Bench:
Eddy Lacy
Dexter Mcluster
Aaron Dobson
Isiah Pead
Vick Ballard
Ty Hilton
Chris Givens

My league trades often and hits the waver wire hard.

Questions are
1. Would you please rank my team, let me know where I"m weak, etc.

2. Which players should I try to trade for, adn which players do you think I should try and get rid of?

Thanks

On September 03 2013 13:09 sniderstyle wrote: I'm in a 12 man, 300$ league QB, 2RB, 2WR, TE, Flex, D, Kicker QB: Tony Romo RB: Ray Rice, Lamar Miller WR: Dez Bryant WR: Jordy Nelson TE: Fred Davis Flex: Daryl Richardson D: Bucs ( They play your jets week 1) I usually just pick up defenses every week that play against teh worst teams in the league Kicker : Kai Forsath ( Redskins) Bench: Eddy Lacy Dexter Mcluster Aaron Dobson Isiah Pead Vick Ballard Ty Hilton Chris Givens My league trades often and hits the waver wire hard. Questions are 1. Would you please rank my team, let me know where I"m weak, etc. 2. Which players should I try to trade for, adn which players do you think I should try and get rid of? Thanks

really like this team. i personally think aaron dobson and dexter mccluster are undraftable, but the rest of the team is very solid. i like ty hilton and chris givens a lot, but i usually try and aim for the following guys: alshon jeffrey, josh gordon, justin blackmon in the same area right around pick 90-110. i think alshon jeffrey has a lot of upside and im a big fan of having guys missing early games like gordon/blackmon as your WR4-5 because they get drafted later but their points per game for the last 12-14 games of the season are in the eric decker range so you get great value on those picks. but all in all love your rb (4 starters with 2 upside backups including a handcuff), good WR, a top 12 QB. not a big fan of fred davis but who cares about TE. and i have the same plan at DEF/K. at D im going mostly new england, tampa bay and st louis. and at kicker week 1 im going with hauschka mostly (seattle kicker playing carolina) or gostkowski, but forbath would be my next choice cause the eagles are garbage.

Had two drafts so far and have a third one tonight. I'll update that one after. All three of them are standard scoring. What do you think of these teams and my draft order?

Team 1, 7th pick in a 12 team league:

7 QB Matt Stafford
3 WR Victor Cruz
4 WR Marques Colston
1 RB Marshawn Lynch
2 RB Stevan Ridley
6 TE Jared Cook
8 WR/TE Mike Wallace
13 K Phil Dawson
10 DEF Texans

5 B Chris Ivory
9 B Mark Ingram
11 B Denarius Moore
12 B Bilal Powell

Team 2, 7th pick in a 10 team league:

6 QB Colin Kaepernick
4 WR Roddy White
3 WR Victor Cruz
1 RB Jamaal Charles
2 RB Maurice Jones Drew
7 TE Jared Cook
5 WR/RB Daryl Richardson
14 K Robbie Gould
12 DEF Broncos

8 B Mike Wallace
9 B TY Hilton
11 B Lance Moore
10 B Zach Sudfeld
13 B Percy Harvin

any guess as to what kind of ROI you might have in these things? or significant data for other people's ROIs.

I disagree on the early round strategy a bit. I like RB for 2 of the first 3 picks but in my 10man full PPR league I ended up going RB RB RB and really like how it turned out.

QB: Ryan
RB: martin
RB: sjax
WR: Welker
WR: wayne
WR: steve smith
Flex: reggie bush
TE: cook

Bench: vereen, woodhead, josh gordon, miles austin, kembrell thompkins, alshon jeffrey


I actually went in intending to go some combo of RB RB WR (had 3rd pick) but when sjax fell to me I couldnt resist and then I grabbed reggie over recievers like fitz (top 5 were gone). Reggie may catch 100 balls this year. I think you can grab 3 top 20 WRs in rounds 4-6 when others are forced to grab RBs like lamar, monte, lacy etc..

On September 03 2013 17:46 djforever wrote: Had two drafts so far and have a third one tonight. I'll update that one after. All three of them are standard scoring. What do you think of these teams and my draft order? [quote] Team 1, 7th pick in a 12 team league: 7 QB Matt Stafford 3 WR Victor Cruz 4 WR Marques Colston 1 RB Marshawn Lynch 2 RB Stevan Ridley 6 TE Jared Cook 8 WR/TE Mike Wallace 13 K Phil Dawson 10 DEF Texans 5 B Chris Ivory 9 B Mark Ingram 11 B Denarius Moore 12 B Bilal Powell

everyone has different running back rankings, but i dont like ridley at pick 18. i have him in the mid 20s value wise. id rather have the following guys than ridley, even in non PPR: CJ2k, wilson, MJD, sjax, gore, dez, aj green, demaryius, julio and graham. RB do go up in value with a flex because they are an attractive option there in non PPR, but i prefer those other players instead.

think chris ivory usually goes a bit later than that, thinking around pick 75-80. same with jared cook, a bit too early for him. rounds 7-9 went very well, think its too early to take a defense round 10. if you do you need to go SEA/SF. after that a lot of these teams have rough schedules to the point id rather have NE the first 3 weeks and then committee aftewards. Denarious moore has all sorts of attitude issues and i try to avoid drafting him and bilal powell isnt draftable in a league this shallow with only 13 slots.

Team 2, 7th pick in a 10 team league: 6 QB Colin Kaepernick 4 WR Roddy White 3 WR Victor Cruz 1 RB Jamaal Charles 2 RB Maurice Jones Drew 7 TE Jared Cook 5 WR/RB Daryl Richardson 14 K Robbie Gould 12 DEF Broncos 8 B Mike Wallace 9 B TY Hilton 11 B Lance Moore 10 B Zach Sudfeld 13 B Percy Harvin

love rounds 1-4. daryl generally goes around pick 65-75 for me so maybe a little reach on him. great value on kaepernick in 6th, i think hes basically equal to peyton/brady this year. early on cook again, good receivers in the 8-12 rounds but forget harvin, not worth taking up a roster spot in a league like this. maybe if you had 18 slots its ok, but 14 is not enough. would much rather have someone like isaiah pead to back up richardson

On September 03 2013 18:07 bigredhoss wrote: any guess as to what kind of ROI you might have in these things? or significant data for other people's ROIs.

im not sure. most of my leagues are the yahoo pro leagues, 10 man, 250 buyin, prizepool is 2250 so its 225+25 for a pretty large rake. given how people draft id guess my ROI is around 10% but im not really sure. it also depends on your draft #.

if all players were equal, i believe this is how often everyone wins:
1: 16%
2: 13%
3: 11%
4: 10%
5-10: 8-9%

its just a huge advantage drafting early

On September 03 2013 18:29 YouGoTGoT wrote: I disagree on the early round strategy a bit. I like RB for 2 of the first 3 picks but in my 10man full PPR league I ended up going RB RB RB and really like how it turned out. QB: Ryan RB: martin RB: sjax WR: Welker WR: wayne WR: steve smith Flex: reggie bush TE: cook Bench: vereen, woodhead, josh gordon, miles austin, kembrell thompkins, alshon jeffrey I actually went in intending to go some combo of RB RB WR (had 3rd pick) but when sjax fell to me I couldnt resist and then I grabbed reggie over recievers like fitz (top 5 were gone). Reggie may catch 100 balls this year. I think you can grab 3 top 20 WRs in rounds 4-6 when others are forced to grab RBs like lamar, monte, lacy etc..

i used to be all about going RB-RB-RB or at least 2 RB in first 3 rounds, but in these 2 RB leagues with no flex and 3 WR i believe its a mistake. reason being that you can just get so many RB in later rounds, even starting running backs up til the 9th round. here is a draft I just did, 10 man yahoo pro league i had the #1 pick:

AP
demaryius thomas
jimmy graham
dwayne bowe
frank gore
colin kaepernick
darren mcfadden
miles austin
deangelo williams
kenny britt
chris givens
alshon jeffrey
ronnie hillman
hauschka
cleveland D (play miami and STL/TB/NE were all gone)

i still end up with 4 starting RB by not even trying, guys just fall further than you think. if i decided to take a 3rd WR or cam newton instead of gore, i would have been able to get DMC/mathews at the 5/6 turn. you can wait a long time in 10 team leagues, especially without flex.


now if theres a flex its a bit different and RB go up in value as its nice to be able to start 3 running backs. going RB-RB-RB is definitely an option, especially in full PPR when you can get reggie bush that late. just insane. guy is going to average 120 total yards, 4.5 receptions and .5 touchdowns every game. he should be a top 15 pick in full PPR. really like your team a lot

On September 03 2013 18:29 YouGoTGoT wrote: I disagree on the early round strategy a bit. I like RB for 2 of the first 3 picks but in my 10man full PPR league I ended up going RB RB RB and really like how it turned out. QB: Ryan RB: martin RB: sjax WR: Welker WR: wayne WR: steve smith Flex: reggie bush TE: cook Bench: vereen, woodhead, josh gordon, miles austin, kembrell thompkins, alshon jeffrey I actually went in intending to go some combo of RB RB WR (had 3rd pick) but when sjax fell to me I couldnt resist and then I grabbed reggie over recievers like fitz (top 5 were gone). Reggie may catch 100 balls this year. I think you can grab 3 top 20 WRs in rounds 4-6 when others are forced to grab RBs like lamar, monte, lacy etc..

one other thing about player groupings. it obviously changes quite a bit from non PPR to PPR, but here is how i group WR in full PPR

calvin

aj, dez, demaryius
julio, marshall
andre, fitz

roddy, cruz, vjax
bowe, amendola, cobb
brown
wayne/colston/decker/torrey

and the issue is often that when it gets to pick #50-60, all of these players are gone. and there is a gap from around 52 to 65 where you would rather draft other positions since the ADP of guys like cecil/steve smith/miles is much lower. specifically in the 5th/6th rounds you usually dont want WR (which is why i went kaep/DMC in my draft). also when you have an early pick, it doesnt get back to you until late round 4 and by then a lot of really good receivers are gone. i got very lucky to have bowe fall to me in round 4, if he didnt id have to take torrey or maybe cam instead. i originally wanted demaryius/julio at the turn but since graham fell to me i had to take him

May as well post my team. Picking 12th in a 12 team league, obviously. This is 0.5 PPR and 0.02 return yardage, which makes Randall Cobb the second WR according to fftoolbox and 3rd according to Yahoo's computers. Trent Richardson went 11th or I would have grabbed him instead. Drafting last kinda sucks. Draft was a week ago before Brown got hurt.

Oh yeah, QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, TE, W/R/T flex, DEF, K. So 1 extra roster spot than usual.

1. (12) Dez Bryant WR
2. (13) Randall Cobb WR
3. (36) David Wilson RB
4. (37) DeMarco Murray RB
5. (60) Lamar Miller RB
6. (61) Jordy Nelson WR
7. (84) Andrew Luck QB
8. (85) Jared Cook TE
9. (108) Kenny Britt WR
10. (109) Michael Floyd WR
11. (132) Justin Blackmon WR
12. (133) Knowshon Moreno RB
13. (156) Jacquizz Rodgers RB
14. (157) San Diego DEF
15. (180) Steven Hauschka K

I already ditched Jacquizz to add the Tampa Bay DEF for that week 1 matchup against the Jets. San Diego has good matchups for weeks 2 and 3, and then back to TB for week 4.

{I still lean torwards at least 2 rbs for the same reason you said (albeit opposite): WR is soooooo deep. However, it all depends how the draft goes and where you are drafting. 2nd pick is a completely different draft vs say the 9th pick. My only goal was to draft the best available and thats what I did. I could easily have gone rb wr wr but the value was at RB. It helps to have amatuer players in your league. I won this same league last year getting carried by calvin and marshall so im curious to see how this goes. I guess my point is, you dont pigeon hole yourself, you draft value wherever it is.

Not a huge fan of julio or AJ in ppr. I feel like last year was AJs ceiling on that team. Also julio is inconsistent at times. Huge fan of dez this year he is my clear #2. Disclaimer: diehard cowboys fan.

Daut, look at my team again, would you drop one to add jaquizz? Or bell? I did not grab any handcuffs.

I think I drafted better in the third draft. 12 team league I picked 6th.

6 QB Matt Ryan
1 RB Ray Rice
3 RB Frank Gore
2 WR AJ Green
4 WR Danny Amendola
10 TE Jared Cook
5 WR/RB Ryan Mathews
13 K Robbie Gould
12 DEF Tampa Bay

7 B Greg Jennings
8 B Steve Johnson
9 B Isaac Redman
11 B Zach Sudfeld

On September 03 2013 19:08 ShadowDrgn wrote: May as well post my team. Picking 12th in a 12 team league, obviously. This is 0.5 PPR and 0.02 return yardage, which makes Randall Cobb the second WR according to fftoolbox and 3rd according to Yahoo's computers. Trent Richardson went 11th or I would have grabbed him instead. Drafting last kinda sucks. Draft was a week ago before Brown got hurt. Oh yeah, QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, TE, W/R/T flex, DEF, K. So 1 extra roster spot than usual. 1. (12) Dez Bryant WR 2. (13) Randall Cobb WR 3. (36) David Wilson RB 4. (37) DeMarco Murray RB 5. (60) Lamar Miller RB 6. (61) Jordy Nelson WR 7. (84) Andrew Luck QB 8. (85) Jared Cook TE 9. (108) Kenny Britt WR 10. (109) Michael Floyd WR 11. (132) Justin Blackmon WR 12. (133) Knowshon Moreno RB 13. (156) Jacquizz Rodgers RB 14. (157) San Diego DEF 15. (180) Steven Hauschka K I already ditched Jacquizz to add the Tampa Bay DEF for that week 1 matchup against the Jets. San Diego has good matchups for weeks 2 and 3, and then back to TB for week 4.

i dont think cobb gains that much. i think hes probably likely to have about 700 return yards and .5 touchdowns which adds 17 points to his season total. i think that places him around 7th best, slightly below demaryius/julio/marshall but ahead of andre/fitz. think he should be drafted around #20.

wilson at 36 so so so nice now that brown is out. demarco at 37 good too. love lamar at 60 and jordy at 61. love most of your draft. do think cook is maybe a round too early and dont like the cobb pick that early but overall turned out really really great every other pick

On September 03 2013 19:20 YouGoTGoT wrote: Daut, look at my team again, would you drop one to add jaquizz? Or bell? I did not grab any handcuffs.

no, vereen/woodhead way way way too good in PPR. and your other bench players are just better than joique and jacquizz. dont worry too much about no handcuffs. just dont use waivers and do free agency to build a good spot in case something bad happens you can pick up a backup then

On September 03 2013 22:23 djforever wrote: I think I drafted better in the third draft. 12 team league I picked 6th. 6 QB Matt Ryan 1 RB Ray Rice 3 RB Frank Gore 2 WR AJ Green 4 WR Danny Amendola 10 TE Jared Cook 5 WR/RB Ryan Mathews 13 K Robbie Gould 12 DEF Tampa Bay 7 B Greg Jennings 8 B Steve Johnson 9 B Isaac Redman 11 B Zach Sudfeld

first 8 rounds are nice. think isaac redman was a mistake. news out that bell is trying to make it back by week 2 even. probably week 3 or 4 though. but even though redman is the "starter" i do expect dwyer and stephens howling to get a bunch of touches and eat into his projections. redman is at best like a 13th rounder

12 team league with standard scoring except there are bonuses for eclipsing 300/400 yards passing, and 100/150 yards rushing/receiving

I picked 2nd

7 QB Michael Vick
1 RB Doug Martin
3 RB MJD
4 WR Reggie Wayne
5 WR Antonio Brown
2 TE Jimmy Graham
6 RB/WR Cecil Shorts
15 K Dan Bailey
13 D Pittsburgh

8 BN Leveon Bell
9 BN Vincent Brown
10 BN Lance Moore
11 BN Bryce Brown
12 BN Vick Ballard
14 BN Philip Rivers

I know everyone is going to hate my QBs but I think both of my QB's are decent value QBs at their position. (Yes I'm a Chargers fan.) Besides that do you have any comments?

On September 03 2013 23:28 Daut wrote: Show nested quote + On September 03 2013 22:23 djforever wrote: I think I drafted better in the third draft. 12 team league I picked 6th. 6 QB Matt Ryan 1 RB Ray Rice 3 RB Frank Gore 2 WR AJ Green 4 WR Danny Amendola 10 TE Jared Cook 5 WR/RB Ryan Mathews 13 K Robbie Gould 12 DEF Tampa Bay 7 B Greg Jennings 8 B Steve Johnson 9 B Isaac Redman 11 B Zach Sudfeld first 8 rounds are nice. think isaac redman was a mistake. news out that bell is trying to make it back by week 2 even. probably week 3 or 4 though. but even though redman is the "starter" i do expect dwyer and stephens howling to get a bunch of touches and eat into his projections. redman is at best like a 13th rounder

I thought Pitt dropped Dwyer?

And here's another question for a different league (standard scoring, no PPR):

Antonio Brown vs Ten, Jordy Nelson vs SF, or Rashard Mendenhall vs Stl for flex position?

On September 03 2013 23:58 djforever wrote: Show nested quote + On September 03 2013 23:28 Daut wrote:   On September 03 2013 22:23 djforever wrote: I think I drafted better in the third draft. 12 team league I picked 6th. 6 QB Matt Ryan 1 RB Ray Rice 3 RB Frank Gore 2 WR AJ Green 4 WR Danny Amendola 10 TE Jared Cook 5 WR/RB Ryan Mathews 13 K Robbie Gould 12 DEF Tampa Bay 7 B Greg Jennings 8 B Steve Johnson 9 B Isaac Redman 11 B Zach Sudfeld first 8 rounds are nice. think isaac redman was a mistake. news out that bell is trying to make it back by week 2 even. probably week 3 or 4 though. but even though redman is the "starter" i do expect dwyer and stephens howling to get a bunch of touches and eat into his projections. redman is at best like a 13th rounder I thought Pitt dropped Dwyer?

yea brainfarted, meant felix jones

On September 03 2013 23:52 Pacifist wrote: 12 team league with standard scoring except there are bonuses for eclipsing 300/400 yards passing, and 100/150 yards rushing/receiving I picked 2nd 7 QB Michael Vick 1 RB Doug Martin 3 RB MJD 4 WR Reggie Wayne 5 WR Antonio Brown 2 TE Jimmy Graham 6 RB/WR Cecil Shorts 15 K Dan Bailey 13 D Pittsburgh 8 BN Leveon Bell 9 BN Vincent Brown 10 BN Lance Moore 11 BN Bryce Brown 12 BN Vick Ballard 14 BN Philip Rivers I know everyone is going to hate my QBs but I think both of my QB's are decent value QBs at their position. (Yes I'm a Chargers fan.) Besides that do you have any comments?

theres nothing wrong with vick+committee, but see no reason to roster rivers. i think there are 10 better QB you can use in a committee: dalton, smith, schaub, eli, ben, bradford, flacco etc. unreal to get graham/MJD that late

On September 04 2013 01:07 Pacifist wrote: And here's another question for a different league (standard scoring, no PPR): Antonio Brown vs Ten, Jordy Nelson vs SF, or Rashard Mendenhall vs Stl for flex position?

in non PPR there arent many WR that are going to be better than a starting running back. i go mendenhall.

if i had to project their lines:
mendenhall 80 total yards, .5 td
brown 60 yards .5 td
jordy 60 yards .5 td

peyton manning lol...

Daut I just had one other quick question:

Week 1, should I start Eddy Lacy @ SF or Ryan Matthews playing vs HOU @ home? Neither seems to have a favorable matchup and they're both projected 9 points in our league