Evaluating my Predictions

For the most part, this blog is designed to help with advanced Fantasy Football strategy.  I don't usually talk Sits/Starts, individual player prognostications, or make overly bold predictions on Week to Week performance.  I am mostly trying to help with the in-game strategy: Roster Movement, Team Building, & Talent Evaluation.  During the 2012 Fantasy Season, I did make several predictions about individual players that I wanted to evaluate now so that my readers could see where I steered them during the season.

1) Trent Richardson is Overrated - Fiction

I was pretty steadfast in my belief that Trent Richardson was going to be a bust this year.  I did not believe that he could be your bell cow RB1 and that you needed to pair Richardson with another elite RB in order to fully appreciate what he could bring to the table.  In standard scoring, non-PPR formats, Richardson finished as the #9 RB, 1 of 10 RBs to surpass 200 fantasy points.  He only scored less than 10 fantasy points 4 times and averaged 12.73 ppg, which owners will take happily from their RB1 (all things considered, AP was the #1 RB and averaged 17.2 ppg over the 16 game fantasy season).  I'll have Richardson easily in my RB Top 10 going into 2013.

2) Get a Piece of the Atlanta Falcons Passing Game - Fact

This was probably not a major surprise to experienced fantasy owners, but the stats back up the claim.  Julio Jones and Roddy White finished #9 and #10 respectively at the WR position, Tony Gonzalez finished #3 at the TE position, and Matt Ryan finished as the #7 QB.

3) The RB Top Tier is on the Decline - Fact and Fiction

Coming into the 2012 season, Arian Foster, Ray Rice & LeSean McCoy were the consensus Top 3 picks and Adrian Peterson was a 2nd or 3rd round gamble coming off a destroyed ACL.  Only Arian Foster finished in the Top 3 at season's end, with Rice finishing 6th and McCoy finishing 21st despite missing 4 games due to injury.  Peterson and Doug Martin were the Top 2 backs and the value they provided for where they were drafted makes them each a pleasant surprise.  The reason that this is Fact and Fiction is that  while the consensus Top 3 suffered a drop off, the RB position as a whole is in better shape going forward than in any of the previous 3 seasons.  Backs like Alfred Morris and Stevan Ridley showed they can be fantasy mainstays in headache offenses, Marshawn Lynch provided owners with another late season surge and Jamaal Charles and Frank Gore (despite many headaches) proved reliable

4) Pass on Beanie Wells - Fact

Beanie finished the season as the 58th best RB and missed most of the season due to injury.  This was an easy pass.

5) Pass on Shonn Greene - Fiction

Greene finished as the 15th best RB in Fantasy Football this year.  He scored less than 10 fantasy points in 8 of the 16 standard fantasy weeks, and his 4 straight weeks under 10 between Weeks 2-5 probably landed him on the Waiver Wire or your bench.  He was a beast in the Fantasy Playoffs, however, averaging 13.5 ppg in the most important stretch of the fantasy season, 3.6 ppg higher than his season average, including a monster 20 point performance during Fantasy Championship Week.  He's probably a Top 20 RB at the very least going into 2013.

6) Pass on the Houston Texans Passing Game - Fact and Fiction (Mostly Fact)

Andre Johnson finished in the WR Top 8, but his road there was a major struggle for fantasy owners.  Andre 3000 managed 10 points or less in 5 of the first 7 weeks and finally started helping fantasy owners in the back stretch of the season.  He did put up 9.5 points or better in each of the 3 standard playoff weeks, but his 6 10+ point performances during the season probably didn't help any of his extremely patient owners win championships.  Owen Daniels finished 8th among TEs, but he only managed double digit fantasy points 4 times all season and completely disappeared during the fantasy playoffs, managing a total of 9.1 points during Weeks 14-16.  No other Texans pass catcher was relevant on a Week to Week basis and Matt Schaub only finished 18th among QBs.  Arian Foster even had his lowest pass-catching output in his 3 years as the full time Texans' starter.

7) Buy In to Rashad Jennings - Fiction

Swing and a Miss on this one.  My apologies to anyone who bought into my preseason hype for this guy.  Jennings was the 60th RB on the final board this season and his only two 10+ point performances likely happened on the Waiver Wire.  He scored 16.2 points as an injury replacement vs. Oakland in Week 7 and 10.5 points as an injury replacement (the week after losing his starting job to Jalen Parmele) in Week 12 against Tennessee.  Forget about this guy going forward.

8) RG3 is for Real - Fact

No need for elaboration.  We all know this worked out well for those who drafted him or managed to snag him off waivers after Week 1.

9) BenJarvus Green-Ellis will be a Top 15 RB - Fiction

He ended up 19th.  Cincinnati was a pass happy offense between Weeks 3-7, with the running game almost completely non-existent.  The Law Firm did, however, lead most of his owners towards a Championship, scoring 10+ points in each week from Weeks 11-15 before completely disappearing in Week 16.  I'll have him among my Top 20 RBs in 2013, but I'm not reaching out to grab him earlier than Rounds 4 or 5.

10) The Trio of RBs with Preseason Injury Concerns (AP, MJD, Lynch) are 100% Fine - Fact and Fiction

MJD is the fiction here.  He didn't play a single snap after Week 7 and those who took a shot on him after his summer-long holdout didn't reap any benefits of their good faith.  AP only finished #1 overall, 8 yards shy of breaking the all-time rushing record while Lynch built on an amazing 2011 campaign with an even better 2012 season, finishing 4th overall at the RB position.  AP and Lynch will go in the 1st round of most drafts next year and will be the players you build your teams around.

11) Pass on Thursday Night Football - Fact

There were players that managed to excel on Thursday Nights, but for the most part, these games delivered disappointing fantasy lines for your Must-Start Fantasy stars.  Every team plays on Thursday throughout the season, so you can't avoid them completely, but my advice will remain the same going into 2013: don't take risks on Thursday Night and only start those players that you would normally start without question.

12) Justin Blackmon, Cecil Shorts, Ryan Broyles, Colin Kaepernick and Pierre Garcon will be your 2012 Fantasy Lottery Tickets - Fact and Fiction

Blackmon - Averaged 9.6 ppg Week 14-16 and had his best game in Championship Week.  Not a lottery ticket, but a solid WR2.

Shorts - Missed Week 14 due to a concussion and scored 15.5 total points in Weeks 15-16.  Swing and a Miss.

Broyles - Tore his ACL before the Fantasy Playoffs started.  You have to think he would have made a positive impact had he been around.  The good news is you had time to address this issue before the most important time of the fantasy season.

Kaepernick - Scored 15 or more points in each game including a monster 4 TD performance against New England in Week 15.  If you were making a QB switch at this time of the year, these were very acceptable numbers.

Garcon - Averaged just short of 10 ppg during Week 14-16, including his best performance in Week 14 against Baltimore (14.5 points).  Washington underwent a QB change due to injury in Week 15 and he scored 8.9 in Week 16, making him an acceptable WR3, but probably not the lottery ticket I assumed he could be.

The player I missed out on for Playoff Time was Knowshon Moreno.  He scored 12+ points in each game Weeks 14-16, averaging 18 ppg in total.  I didn't think he was going to be the guy after Willis McGahee went down, and I was wrong.  Hopefully, you grabbed him.

Overall, Fantasy Prognostication is extremely difficult on a Week to Week basis.  It is tough to pinpoint where points are going to come from when you are looking into the 2nd tier of fantasy players.  The rankings system I am developing for the 2013 season are going to make this task a lot easier.  I have some preliminary specifications I am trying to validate as useful and these rankings will hopefully revolutionize the game.  If you've taken my advice in the past, please stick with me through this process, as I hope to develop a new way to evaluate talent from a Fantasy Perspective on a Week to Week basis.

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