Some Fantasy Football Analysis

Several weeks ago, my dad asked how many "elite" players there were at each position. This conversation led to an attempt to identify the "elite" players at each position. Now that the season has ended, here's what I came up with:

The first step was recording the scores of all the starting players - a starter in this case is any player that should have been started based on his points for the season. So, for example, there are 12 teams and one QB spot, so the top 12 QBs should have been started. Similarly, there are 12 teams and two RBs spots, so the top 24 RBs should have been started. We also start 2 WRs and just 1 TE, D/ST, Kicker, and a Flex.

Once I had all that information in excel it was pretty easy to analyze the data. I started off by setting my arbitrary "elite" line at 80% of the #1 player's point total. This worked well for RBs, WRs and TEs, but not so well for QBs (the top 7 QBs were considered "elite" with a cut-off of 80%). When I hiked the limit up to 90% for QBs, just 3 were considered elite. The final tallies for "elite" players by position were:

QB: 3
RB: 5
WR: 4
TE: 2
D/ST: 3
K: 3

General drafting strategies tell you not to draft a defense or kicker until much later in the draft so that leaves us with 14 "elite" players in the beginning of the draft. RBs tend to go off the board quickly in the first round while TEs rarely do so, so it certainly seems possible to end up with two "elite" players regardless of where you draft in the first round. Which positions should you target, though?

This is what I found most interesting about the numbers:

If you look at the difference between what the #1 player at each position scored and what the last startable player scored, the numbers make sense and are what I would have guessed ahead of time. The smallest difference is between the #1 and #12 QB; the largest difference is between the #1 RB and the #24 RB. However, the thing that surprised me is that if you look at that difference as a percentage of what the #1 scored (so, in effect, the percentage of points you lose if you were to get the last player instead of the first). RBs, WRs, and TEs were all around 50% (58.7, 47.2, 51.3, respectively). Quarterbacks, though, came in at 24.9% which is more in line with where Kickers (20.95%) and Defenses fell (28.5%).

So what does that mean?

It means that you should focus on drafting RBs, WRs, and getting a top TE early on and wait on QB. The difference between the #1 qb and #12 was just 5.5 points, where the difference between the #1 rb and #24 rb was 10.8!!

Lesson learned: whine as much as possible and you'll get your way

So after spending much of yesterday telling my sob story to just about everyone who would listen, the Packers and Falcons finally got around to playing. And let me tell you this, the Falcons have an atrocious defense:

Yep, I ended up winning after all! Onto the semi-finals to face the #1 seed in the playoffs. Given that I spent much of the night watching football, I don't have a ton to add to this post about World of Warcraft.

I did want to point out something that I just recently noticed in my Garrison:

That big dude, Tormmok, saying "This will be a glorious battle."? He's one of my followers. They pretty much just chill in various parts of your Garrison. It might be a small thing overall, but it's a nice touch, something that makes it feel like it's actually being used. Perhaps my favorite is an NPC that I just added (unfortunately his name escapes me at the moment, starts with an M though) who sits by himself off in a pretty remote area of my Garrison, overlooking a river.

I will likely hit 100 the next time I have a chance to play as I'm half-way through 99 currently. Then I have a tough decision on what final buildings to select for my Garrison. Let's talk about those on Thursday, shall we?

I hate Fantasy Football

A lot of leagues had their first week of playoffs this week, so if you've been subjected to whiny (or gloating) sob stories already, I apologize. Here's mine though:

Our league has 6 playoff spots; the division winners get byes in the first round and only the top 4 get money back. I entered the playoffs as the #5 seed, just a game behind the division winner despite scoring more points than anyone else in the league over the course of the season (Points Scored is a better indicator of a team's true talent level, as it does away with all the randomness of head to head matchups). I averaged almost 5 points more a game than the #2 in points scored! My team is behemoth. Over the past 6 weeks, I've failed to break 100 just once and have averaged 123.7 points a game.

My sob story actually starts last week though. The last week of the regular season, and the division crown (and the bye that went along with it!) was up for grabs. I scored 139.5 points - the second most points scored in a single week over the course of the entire season in our league. The only team to beat that number was, of course, the team that I was playing at the time - they put up over 150 points!

So, okay, no big deal. I am confident in my team's ability and I know that I have a pretty decent matchup in the first round. I'm facing the #4 seed who last broke 100 points in week 8 and has averaged just 83.6 points. In visual form:

Averaging almost 50% more than your opponent seems like a sure-fire win, right?

Wrong!

Heading into tonight I am down by 36.7 points, though I still have two players left to go and my opponent has just one. So I have a slim chance to win, but the two players I have left are averaging 23.4 and 13.7 points respectively, so if they just put up their average I would need his player to get blanked (and it's Atlanta's kicker, so that's pretty unlikely). I need my two guys to both have big days and his player to do close to nothing. So what went wrong?

My players basically put up the numbers they were expected to; I'm projected to score ~120 points which would be in line with my average. Instead, it's what did his players do:

• Russel Wilson has averaged 20.2 points this year and had scored over 22.5 points just twice before this week. He scored 29.3.
• DeMarco Murray has averaged 17.9 points this year and had scored over 21.5 points just twice before this week. He scored 28.8
• AJ Green has averaged 8.1 points this year and had not once broken the 20 point barrier. He had scored over 12.5 points just twice before this week. He scored 28.4.

Those 3 players alone add up to more than my opponent had been averaging! Needless to say, I am not happy with how this has played out.

Well this is kinda crazy

You'll have to forgive a fantasy football themed post, but, as the title says, I thought this was pretty crazy and was worth sharing.

Over the weekend, the one undefeated team in our league ("My Hittas My Hittas") had a rough day. He started Philip Rivers (-5.05) and the San Diego Defense (-3.36), so he was likely assured of losing regardless of what the rest of his players did. The other players he had going in the early games didn't step up to the plate, with 3 of them combining to score just 16.9 points. Around 4 pm, he posted a joking message on the message board of our league, apologizing for the shoddy performance of his players and vowing that there would be changes made to ensure that never happened again.

The typical fantasy league back and forth then occurred, which was humorous but nothing worth sharing. Until a long-time friend (also in the league) messaged me today. To paraphrase:

LTFriend: I think the message board has been more entertaining than the actual league this year. For me anyway [since I'm in last place].
Me: Yea, I like these new guys. (My Hittas is new, right?)
LTFriend: He is. That's former Orioles pitcher Steve Johnson.

... what?! WHOA!

Now, if you're not from Baltimore you may not know who Steve Johnson is. He didn't play for long, but I remember his performance in 2012 when the Orioles made the playoffs for the first time since 1997.

Thinking this was pretty cool, I immediately messaged another friend of mine who is probably the biggest Orioles fan I know. Reading that makes me sound like an excited school girl, which probably isn't too far from the truth.

His response? "Woah! I saw him tweet out his score!" And sure enough, he had!