Drafting a QB early... did the experts get it right?

[historymike]

it sounds like your winning strategy is actually to play in 8 team leagues with kindergarteners.

 

Actually, all three of my leagues are 10-team leagues with experienced players. In the league I highlighted, I took Jamaal Charles, then Megatron, then Forte, Mathews, Jackson, Romo, and Best. My RBs in rounds 3-7 were all un-sexy picks, but they have delivered well. However, this league went QB and WR crazy in the higher rounds, which opened up a few RB nuggets. The "mob psychology" reference is also known as the contrarian strategy: when there is a sudden run on one position, it means that there is unclaimed value in another position that is waiting to be snagged.

 

And the "kindergartners" quip: most FF players lock themselves to some sort of draft formula. By doing so, they stop looking for relative overall value ("I want the best player available this round"), and instead look for value by position in around ("I want the best RB possible this round"). Heck, this very thread shows how many players have some sort of reliance on a positional draft order.

 

I am just saying what has worked for me the last few years; if you prefer another strategy, that's cool, but no need to insult me by suggesting that my successes are only due to playing inferior opponents. One of my leagues (a local, not the one profiled) has six original owners who have played for 17 seasons, and there are some real FF sharks in that group. Yet even in this higher-stakes league with something like two centuries of FF experience, it is clear that many owners have a positional strategy, along with certain "must-have" players that blind their thinking. My strategy is to simply identify overlooked value and make it mine.

[Azazello1313]

Actually, all three of my leagues are 10-team leagues with experienced players. In the league I highlighted, I took Jamaal Charles, then Megatron, then Forte, Mathews, Jackson, Romo, and Best. My RBs in rounds 3-7 were all un-sexy picks, but they have delivered well. However, this league went QB and WR crazy in the higher rounds, which opened up a few RB nuggets. The "mob psychology" reference is also known as the contrarian strategy: when there is a sudden run on one position, it means that there is unclaimed value in another position that is waiting to be snagged.

 

And the "kindergartners" quip: most FF players lock themselves to some sort of draft formula. By doing so, they stop looking for relative overall value ("I want the best player available this round"), and instead look for value by position in around ("I want the best RB possible this round"). Heck, this very thread shows how many players have some sort of reliance on a positional draft order.

 

I am just saying what has worked for me the last few years; if you prefer another strategy, that's cool, but no need to insult me by suggesting that my successes are only due to playing inferior opponents. One of my leagues (a local, not the one profiled) has six original owners who have played for 17 seasons, and there are some real FF sharks in that group. Yet even in this higher-stakes league with something like two centuries of FF experience, it is clear that many owners have a positional strategy, along with certain "must-have" players that blind their thinking. My strategy is to simply identify overlooked value and make it mine.

 

the point is, a "strategy" where you get jahvid best in the 7th round isn't going to be applicable to most leagues regular huddlers play in. just sayin.

[historymike]

<facepalm>

 

So every RB, WR, and QB in your leagues was approximately drafted in a place where they should have been? At no point was there unclaimed value? Your leagues are all filled with owners who intricately study value, and ignore positional strategies?

 

Also: Mikel Leshoure (torn Achilles) is the major reason Jahvid Best fell so low, as there was expected to be a RBBC in Detroit between Best and the rookie RB, but many information sources were slow to raise expectations on Best. This is especially true on sources that put weight on mock draft results. Also, if you factor out that monster 3-TD, 232-yard game against Philly in Week Two last year, Best was pretty forgettable in 2010, especially when he had that lingering turf toe problem. With injuries and so-so production in 2010 Best SHOULD have fallen to the fifth or sixth round in most leagues, so getting him early in round seven - while still a steal - is hardly indicative that this league is somehow deficient.

 

But hey: I have a lot going on, and no time to participate in what is shaping up to be a pointless debate, so if you want the last word on how sucky my leagues must be, it's all yours. :-)

Edited October 6, 2011 by historymike

[Azazello1313]

your leagues suck.

[rajncajn]

Here hm/Az, let me save you both some time.

 

your leagues suck.

 

your arguments suck

 

you suck.

 

no YOU suck

 

you both suck.

 

you both are banned.

[CrimsonGhost]

<facepalm>

 

So every RB, WR, and QB in your leagues was approximately drafted in a place where they should have been? At no point was there unclaimed value? Your leagues are all filled with owners who intricately study value, and ignore positional strategies?

 

Also: Mikel Leshoure (torn Achilles) is the major reason Jahvid Best fell so low, as there was expected to be a RBBC in Detroit between Best and the rookie RB, but many information sources were slow to raise expectations on Best. This is especially true on sources that put weight on mock draft results. Also, if you factor out that monster 3-TD, 232-yard game against Philly in Week Two last year, Best was pretty forgettable in 2010, especially when he had that lingering turf toe problem. With injuries and so-so production in 2010 Best SHOULD have fallen to the fifth or sixth round in most leagues, so getting him early in round seven - while still a steal - is hardly indicative that this league is somehow deficient.

 

But hey: I have a lot going on, and no time to participate in what is shaping up to be a pointless debate, so if you want the last word on how sucky my leagues must be, it's all yours. :-)

 

 

10 man leagues don't count. It is childs play.

[Grits and Shins]

I wish I could have gotten Jimmy Graham in the 10th round of ANY of my leagues

[Grits and Shins]

Or Forte in the 3rd round ...

[BrooklynCrew]

As I said many times in the preseason, and will say again as the numbers this year continue to represent the philosophy, I'll load my gun up with as many bullets from the early RBs, as they are much more likely to end up top 10 at their position (a position, I'll remind you, that has the highest scoring disparity between starters in most setups), and I'll take my chances on a late round QB that is generalyl as likely to be in the top 10 as the earlier QBs (in the position that generally has the least scoring disparity amongst starters).

 

This is false. The data over the last 7 years shows that QB's are FAR FAR more likely to hit their preseason top 10 status than RB's. There is far more fluctuation in the top 10 rb's than top 10 qb's year over year. It's not even close over the better part of the last decade... especially with the uptick in RBBC's around the league. 10 years ago this was not the case. Things have changed. The top 10 wr's are also a bit more reliable than top 10 rb's, but they fluctuate more than qb's, which of late have been far more stable to hit preseason expectations.

 

This is not an argument for/against the early qb, but the reality is that QB's hit their preseason expectations far more frequently than rbs or wr's. RB variance has grown dramatically over the last decade.

 

Now some people will simply respond "this is exactly why I need to hoard them and make sure I get a good one"...

 

You can argue either way. If I have a top 5 pick I'm getting one of the lone backfield RB's who tend to produce... but the 'wait on rb's' approach is far more viable than it used to be... sure there is lots of luck involved, but that's true for anybody. There just happens to be a LOT more rb's getting touches than ever before. This is reality.

[champ48win]

I wish I could have gotten Jimmy Graham in the 10th round of ANY of my leagues

 

I took Jimmy Graham with my 15th & last pick of the draft.......great value!!!!

[Azazello1313]

I took Jimmy Graham with my 15th & last pick of the draft.......great value!!!!

 

your league sucks too.

 

dammit I am turning into blitz

[Big Country]

This is false. The data over the last 7 years shows that QB's are FAR FAR more likely to hit their preseason top 10 status than RB's. There is far more fluctuation in the top 10 rb's than top 10 qb's year over year. It's not even close over the better part of the last decade... especially with the uptick in RBBC's around the league. 10 years ago this was not the case. Things have changed. The top 10 wr's are also a bit more reliable than top 10 rb's, but they fluctuate more than qb's, which of late have been far more stable to hit preseason expectations.

 

 

I believe you misread what I wrote.. or more likely I wrote it poorly.

 

I agree, the preseason top 10 ranked QBs do end up top 10 more than the RBs. I also can get one of those QBs in the 6th or 7th round (sometimes later) and expect a minimal drop in production compared to the QB I would be taking in the 2nd or 3rd round. The stats have consistently shown this year over year.

 

The top 10 RBs, while not neccessarily ranked in the top 10, are almost always taken in the first 3, maybe 4 rounds. You are usually lucky to get 1-2 (ala Foster last year) that are drafted much later than this. The drop off in production from the top 10 RBs to those below that is far more significant than at the QB position.

 

What I am saying is that, based on this, I much prefer to load my FF gun up with as many RB bullets from the stock that is much more likely to be in the top 10 at the position (read, top 3-4 rounds worth of backs) and then load up on 2 (or more) QBs in the 8-12 round range, where I also have a very reasonable expectation of finding a top 10 performer, whose production is generally not that far off from the guys drafted in the top 2-3 rounds when compared to the RBs drafted in the same range.

 

 

Now, all of this is not to say that a team can't be succesful going QB early, or going TE early, etc., it's just that from a purely mathematical perspective, your odds of success increase (at least in my opinion based on the statistics I've studied) by targeting the positions and players where you perceive a greater dropoff in production from one pick to the next. Obviously, luck plays a large role in this as one must still draft the right players, but this approach minimizes that (ie, I'll take the RB early where we usually see 8 of the top 10 come from, and I'll take a QB late where we usually see 4 of the top 10 come from, rather than taking a QB early where 6 of the top 10 come from and an RB late where 2 of the top 10 come from).

[delusions of grandeur]

This is false. The data over the last 7 years shows that QB's are FAR FAR more likely to hit their preseason top 10 status than RB's. There is far more fluctuation in the top 10 rb's than top 10 qb's year over year. It's not even close over the better part of the last decade... especially with the uptick in RBBC's around the league. 10 years ago this was not the case. Things have changed. The top 10 wr's are also a bit more reliable than top 10 rb's, but they fluctuate more than qb's, which of late have been far more stable to hit preseason expectations.

This only holds true if you look at it as QB vs. RB, but that's not how the game works (unless you can flex a QB)... It's my QB vs your QB, my RBs vs your RBs, my WRs vs your WRs, etc.... So like Det said earlier, if we're comparing QBs, then 1/2 of the top 10 were early QBs, while 1/2 were extremely late QB picks... Looking at RBs, 80% were taken early.... So unless you're one of the lucky ones to strike on the 20% that came later, you're taking a hit, while those who went RB early and often and waited to pick a couple upside QBs that could be in that 50% gain an advantage...

 

Of course you still have to make the right picks, so yes, I absolutely agree with the counterpoint about the scarcity of good RBs, that "this is exactly why I need to hoard them and make sure I get a good one".... But regardless of which position you take first, the #1 rule of good drafting is to know where you need to pounce and where you can wait... So unless you're just terrible at picking good QBs out of a large pool of good ones, then I'm going to go where I see percieved bigger drop-offs in value, and snatch as many elite-ish RBs and WRs before they go thin. I don't see ever see QB appearing thin like those other positions, where you get into some real crapshoots by the mid-rounds....

 

I mean, even the folks who are regretting taking a Roeth or Ryan still took a solid QB prospect, just with unfortunate O-line issues, but it isn't like Ryan has been doing that bad compared to the strengths you gained by waiting until the 4th-7th round on a QB, and my team with Roeth has tremendous strengths elsewhere... I still do not believe that the numbers, when you look at them as QB vs QB and RB vs RB, show that taking a QB early is anything but a risky move for your other positions.

 

The mere fact that all QBs play all the teams snaps, compared to RBBCs and Wrs that go invisible, should tell you exactly why waiting is still a good strategy. They're not going to put up a goose-egg, while a weaker WR or RB who ends up on the wrong side of a RBBC can get you next to nothing some weeks.

[lkirc]

I usually am the guy who waits the longest to grab a QB, but I decided, in my big money league, to grab Rodgers with the 7th pick this year. I was not in love with any of the RBs there and saw a group of about 15 players that I ranked about even. I was considering MCFadden or Forte and thought one may actually slide to me in the 2nd. So why not grab the "sure thing" QB?

 

It went against everything in my FF DNA, but I pulled the trigger. Forte slipped to me at 2.6 and I was off and running. While I love having Rodgers and my team is doing well, I am suffering at my RB2 position. I think this is the lesson I learned. It is a lot easier to find a decent QB than it is to find a productive RB2 or WR2 later in the draft. If I wouldn't have traded away FJax for Britt it may be different, but that is how FF goes.

 

Now I am rolling out Reggie Bush, McGahee or Jacobs every week. Rodgers better keep throwing for 400 and 4 TDs every week.........

[BrooklynCrew]

I believe you misread what I wrote.. or more likely I wrote it poorly.

 

I agree, the preseason top 10 ranked QBs do end up top 10 more than the RBs. I also can get one of those QBs in the 6th or 7th round (sometimes later) and expect a minimal drop in production compared to the QB I would be taking in the 2nd or 3rd round. The stats have consistently shown this year over year.

 

The top 10 RBs, while not neccessarily ranked in the top 10, are almost always taken in the first 3, maybe 4 rounds. You are usually lucky to get 1-2 (ala Foster last year) that are drafted much later than this. The drop off in production from the top 10 RBs to those below that is far more significant than at the QB position.

 

What I am saying is that, based on this, I much prefer to load my FF gun up with as many RB bullets from the stock that is much more likely to be in the top 10 at the position (read, top 3-4 rounds worth of backs) and then load up on 2 (or more) QBs in the 8-12 round range, where I also have a very reasonable expectation of finding a top 10 performer, whose production is generally not that far off from the guys drafted in the top 2-3 rounds when compared to the RBs drafted in the same range.

 

 

Now, all of this is not to say that a team can't be succesful going QB early, or going TE early, etc., it's just that from a purely mathematical perspective, your odds of success increase (at least in my opinion based on the statistics I've studied) by targeting the positions and players where you perceive a greater dropoff in production from one pick to the next. Obviously, luck plays a large role in this as one must still draft the right players, but this approach minimizes that (ie, I'll take the RB early where we usually see 8 of the top 10 come from, and I'll take a QB late where we usually see 4 of the top 10 come from, rather than taking a QB early where 6 of the top 10 come from and an RB late where 2 of the top 10 come from).

 

What you are not factoring is that HALF of the top 10 rb's year over year are NOT drafted in the first two rounds and are not in the preliminary season picks to be top 10 rb's. They actually come from later rounds because of that higher turnover I noted earlier. That means there are far more RB busts in those picks than QB's. So this old notion that it's safer to draft RB's early is simply not true anymore. The stats do not bear that out. If you load up on lots of rb's early, yes, you are more likely to hit a productive one, and you are also more likely to hit a bust.

[detlef]

What you are not factoring is that HALF of the top 10 rb's year over year are NOT drafted in the first two rounds and are not in the preliminary season picks to be top 10 rb's. They actually come from later rounds because of that higher turnover I noted earlier. That means there are far more RB busts in those picks than QB's. So this old notion that it's safer to draft RB's early is simply not true anymore. The stats do not bear that out. If you load up on lots of rb's early, yes, you are more likely to hit a productive one, and you are also more likely to hit a bust.

Here's the part you're missing. And it's the part that everyone misses. When you take the 8th RB off the board. You're not taking the guy who is supposed to finish 8th amongst RBs, you're taking the guy with the 8th best chance of being good. There's a difference.

 

Take a look at the top 10 RBs drafted in MFL drafts last year:

1. Johnson, Chris TEN RB 1.56 1 129 5820

2. Peterson, Adrian MIN RB 2.46 1 130 5830

3. Jones-Drew, Maurice JAC RB 4.67 1 131 5829

4. Rice, Ray BAL RB 4.93 1 133 5814

5. Gore, Frank SFO RB* 7.46 1 134 5829

6. Turner, Michael ATL RB 9.70 1 132 5818

7. Jackson, Steven STL RB 12.89 1 145 5823

8. Mendenhall, Rashard PIT RB 18.46 1 321 5806

9. Williams, DeAngelo CAR RB* 19.29 2 174 5826

10. Mathews, Ryan SDC RB 21.03 1 641 5825

80% of them finished in the top 15 Only DWill and Ryan Mathews failed to do so. (I should be mentioned that those were the last two of the top 10).

 

Now look at the next 10:

 

11. Grant, Ryan GBP RB* 25.57 1 149 5829

12. Greene, Shonn NYJ RB 26.45 2 223 5807

13. Benson, Cedric CIN RB 31.15 1 229 5806

14. Charles, Jamaal KCC RB 33.40 1 205 5801

15. Thomas, Pierre NOS RB* 36.72 4 190 5817

16. McCoy, LeSean PHI RB 39.56 2 248 5793

17. Wells, Chris ARI RB 45.78 1 223 5780

18. Addai, Joseph IND RB 46.42 3 224 5801

19. Moreno, Knowshon DEN RB 48.61 5 264 5782

20. Forte, Matt CHI RB 49.70 7 232 5788

3 finished in the top 15

 

The likelihood drops off pretty quickly.

 

Also, if you look at total ADP, McCoy comes off the board at pick 36. That means 10 of the top 15 RBs were filled up by the time you got done with the 3rd round. (And yes, I realize it sayd 39.56 next to his name, but that translates to the 36th lowest ADP if you run the group as a whole).

Edited October 6, 2011 by detlef

[buddahj]

Or Forte in the 3rd round ...

Got Forte in the 4th in one of my locals.

 

I took my QBs in the 6th & 10th rounds...Big Ben & Fitz.

Edited October 6, 2011 by buddahj

[Grits and Shins]

What you are not factoring is that HALF of the top 10 rb's year over year are NOT drafted in the first two rounds and are not in the preliminary season picks to be top 10 rb's. They actually come from later rounds because of that higher turnover I noted earlier. That means there are far more RB busts in those picks than QB's. So this old notion that it's safer to draft RB's early is simply not true anymore. The stats do not bear that out. If you load up on lots of rb's early, yes, you are more likely to hit a productive one, and you are also more likely to hit a bust.

 

You are missing his point entirely.

 

He is saying it is 'safer' to find a top 10 QB in the later rounds and use the earlier rounds to draft the RBs that have the highest chances of succeeding ...

[Thews40]

You are missing his point entirely.

 

He is saying it is 'safer' to find a top 10 QB in the later rounds and use the earlier rounds to draft the RBs that have the highest chances of succeeding ...

The top 10 metric isn't as telling IMO as the delta between them. My point with taking a top 3 QB early is that they're more consistent every week. If you have Brady/Brees/Rogers you start them every week, so there is no picking based on match-up. WR's and RB's who score three TD's in a week and taper off the next two aren't as consistent. This isn't foolproof and just because someone drafts Brady/Brees/Rodgers doesn't mean they'll win because of it.

 

I have three teams this year, and on one I have Jacobs/Bradshaw... started them both last week. I was lucky to get TD's out of both, but Rodgers is on fire and easily made up the difference between the hit I took at RB in taking him with 25% of my auction cash.

 

Points to ponder...

 

PPR, points for passing TD's and starting line up factor heavily into the equation. If you only need to start one RB, the need to have two good ones is less.

 

Your team is not measured by one pick. For those that lose players due to injury, it doesn't necessarily damn them for the year.

 

If you have to have a QB/RB/WR/WR/TE and two flex spots, your options change a lot.

 

10 team leagues don't count. In a 12 team league, someone is starting the 12th ranked QB.

 

A good metric to use in gauging drafting talent should probably be Huddle leagues. To get Jimmy Graham late in a draft in a mandatory TE league is crazy. I have him on all three teams and took him in the 4th in one.

 

The metric not being mixed in (because there are so many), is the contribution of the TE and when they're drafted to get your WR's and mid tier QB to go with the two good RB's... but that's another thread.

[Big Country]

The top 10 metric isn't as telling IMO as the delta between them. My point with taking a top 3 QB early is that they're more consistent every week. If you have Brady/Brees/Rogers you start them every week, so there is no picking based on match-up. WR's and RB's who score three TD's in a week and taper off the next two aren't as consistent. This isn't foolproof and just because someone drafts Brady/Brees/Rodgers doesn't mean they'll win because of it.

 

 

Obviously this data could be a one year anomaly, and I do not have the time at present to do a more historical anlaysis, but this post from 2010 addresses the consistency claim that comes up fairly regularly in these debates

 

Pulling stats from a relatively standard scoring league I am a part of (1 per 20 yard passing, 3 point passing TDs), I pulled the percentage of games a QB was a top 5 QB for a week, a top 12 QB for a week (ie, a starter) and then also the percentages for 13-24 performances and 24+ performances. I accounted for the bye week, which I had converted to 0 points to make the formulas work, by removing one game from the calculation at the 24+ category.

 

Interesting stuff.

 

No QB was a top 5 QB more than 50% of the time (Rodgers was top 5 50% of the weeks, not really a surprise given the year he had). Of those that finished top 12 last season, the lowest %age for top 5 was David Garrard at 6% (though, the #13 QB, McNabb, was top 5 38% of weeks, tied for 3rd best percentage, and only 4 points behind Garrard on the year)

 

The top 10 QBs last year all had top 12 weeks of 50% or greater. Again, Rodgers was #1 with 81%, but oddly, Rivers, the #9 QB was 2nd with 75%.

 

One stat that jumped out at me was weeks ranked in the 25+ category.. basically, non starter and even non-starter in a 12 team start 2 QB league. Brees, the #2 overall QB, led the pack with 19% of games in the 25+ range (yes, this includes week 17 when he sat), tied with Cutler and Garrard. Again, Rodgers was the ONLY QB with no games in this range.

 

Metal - I went into this thinking that your theory was likely correct in terms of consistency, but really other than Rodgers and the great season he had, it just didn't hold true. Every single one of the top 10 QBs scored in the top 12 over 50% of the time (and the 13th and 14th ranked QBs, McNabb and Warner were that high as well, with the games missed costing them in overall ranking and giving them higher 25+ games rankings).

 

So, in addition to showing that consistency is pretty much there for all of the top 12 QBs, in this particular league which has fairly "standard scoring" (the rush/rec is 1 per 10 yards and 6 per TD, 1 PPR), the difference from the #1 to #12 QB was 98 points over the season. To compare, assuming a start 2 RB and 3 WR 12 team league, the gap from the #1 to #24 RB was 220 points (and if we exclude the hugh year CJ had, it was still a 150 point gap) and the gap for the 1-36 WR is 160 points (120 if you only start 2 WRs)

 

 

So, if we make the assumption that the 2009 season was not an anomaly, we have now shown that not only is the scoring gap between the #1 and #12 QBs in most leagues not significant compared to the other positions, but the consistency is pretty solid for all of the top 12+ QBs.

 

So, if consistency and scoring level are minimally different, what's the next argument for taking a QB early that we can try and mythbust?

[MikesVikes]

Full disclosure, I picked Rodges in the ladder league. but I got him At 2.01. Luckily Mendenhall was still on the board with my 1.12 pick. Thews grabbed Rodgers at 1.05 and got Jones Drew at 2.08. Thews doesn't always draft the same way I would, but his way seems to work out in the end.

 

Edited you will have to live with the spellin errors. I'm on an iPad and I'm not changing it.

Edited October 7, 2011 by MikesVikes

[Grits and Shins]

The top 10 metric isn't as telling IMO as the delta between them. My point with taking a top 3 QB early is that they're more consistent every week. If you have Brady/Brees/Rogers you start them every week, so there is no picking based on match-up. WR's and RB's who score three TD's in a week and taper off the next two aren't as consistent. This isn't foolproof and just because someone drafts Brady/Brees/Rodgers doesn't mean they'll win because of it.

 

I have three teams this year, and on one I have Jacobs/Bradshaw... started them both last week. I was lucky to get TD's out of both, but Rodgers is on fire and easily made up the difference between the hit I took at RB in taking him with 25% of my auction cash.

 

Points to ponder...

 

PPR, points for passing TD's and starting line up factor heavily into the equation. If you only need to start one RB, the need to have two good ones is less.

 

Your team is not measured by one pick. For those that lose players due to injury, it doesn't necessarily damn them for the year.

 

If you have to have a QB/RB/WR/WR/TE and two flex spots, your options change a lot.

 

10 team leagues don't count. In a 12 team league, someone is starting the 12th ranked QB.

 

A good metric to use in gauging drafting talent should probably be Huddle leagues. To get Jimmy Graham late in a draft in a mandatory TE league is crazy. I have him on all three teams and took him in the 4th in one.

 

The metric not being mixed in (because there are so many), is the contribution of the TE and when they're drafted to get your WR's and mid tier QB to go with the two good RB's... but that's another thread.

 

You site Rodgers, Jacobs and Bradshaw for your argument ... but apparently you acquired them in an auction league. Auction leagues and redraft leagues are two entirely different animals ... you're comparing apples to oranges.

 

In my local league I did not draft a QB until the 7th round - Freeman. Freeman is currently the 12th ranked QB in my league. Granted he is currently 50'ish points behind Rodgers and Brady. Cam and Stafford are in the top 5 but were never projected to be there so they don't really count as nobody was taking those guys early. Freeeman is less than 30 points behind Brees and only 15 points behind Vick. But here is the REAL kicker ... I drafted Fitzpatrick in the 13th round to back up Freeman. Fitzpatrick is currently the 8th ranked QB - only 7 points behind Vick.

 

The team that drafted Rodgers is 2-2, was 1-2 going into week 4

The team that drafted Brady (also Cam) is 3-1.

The team that drafted Brees is 1-3.

The team that drafted Vick is 2-2, was 1-2 going into week 4

The team that drafted Romo is 1-3.

The team that drafted Rivers is 2-2, was 1-2 going into week 4

With Fitz/Freeman my team is 3-1.

 

Hard to draw any real conclusions about where QBs are drafted based on those records - but some of those teams look weaker than their records.

 

Rodgers team owner won in week 4 to avoid going 1-3 on the backs of three players - Rodgers, Bryant, and Jimmy Graham - and he barely won.

Rivers team owner won in week 4 to avoid going 1-3 largely because of Welker and Baltimore's defense.

[detlef]

The top 10 metric isn't as telling IMO as the delta between them. My point with taking a top 3 QB early is that they're more consistent every week. If you have Brady/Brees/Rogers you start them every week, so there is no picking based on match-up. WR's and RB's who score three TD's in a week and taper off the next two aren't as consistent. This isn't foolproof and just because someone drafts Brady/Brees/Rodgers doesn't mean they'll win because of it.

 

I have three teams this year, and on one I have Jacobs/Bradshaw... started them both last week. I was lucky to get TD's out of both, but Rodgers is on fire and easily made up the difference between the hit I took at RB in taking him with 25% of my auction cash.

 

Points to ponder...

 

PPR, points for passing TD's and starting line up factor heavily into the equation. If you only need to start one RB, the need to have two good ones is less.

 

Your team is not measured by one pick. For those that lose players due to injury, it doesn't necessarily damn them for the year.

 

If you have to have a QB/RB/WR/WR/TE and two flex spots, your options change a lot.

 

10 team leagues don't count. In a 12 team league, someone is starting the 12th ranked QB.

 

A good metric to use in gauging drafting talent should probably be Huddle leagues. To get Jimmy Graham late in a draft in a mandatory TE league is crazy. I have him on all three teams and took him in the 4th in one.

 

The metric not being mixed in (because there are so many), is the contribution of the TE and when they're drafted to get your WR's and mid tier QB to go with the two good RB's... but that's another thread.

Actually, the delta between the various tiers within the potential starters is not effective because it implies that we can, not only predict who will be in the top 10, but where they'll be within that list. And that's a pretty bold assumption. Now, there was only one league where I went QB early. One reason was because it was a 2QB league, the other is that I had a feeling that Brady was going to go wild and throw 40TDs (it was a 6 pt per TD league). So I took him at 2.05. Of course, I could have been wrong, but so far, it's working out.

 

However, had I simply thought he was a sure thing to finish "among the QB leaders" than it wouldn't have been worth the high pick. Because, while being among the top 10 certainly makes him a worthy starter, it might mean he's head and shoulders above the competition or it might mean that he's barely better than the guys on the outside looking in.

 

Again, that's the failing of most of these arguments, that you're taking the 5th RB or 5th QB off the board expecting him to end up being the 5th ranked at his position by year's end. You're not. Or at least you shouldn't be. How you should be looking at this is that they're the 5th most likely to be good. Maybe this is born from the fact that people do pre-season player projections, which, honestly seems like a silly exercise. Because it implies that we can pretend to know these things when it's hard enough just trying to figure out who is even going to be good at all.

 

As for the rest of your points to ponder. Obviously all of those factors matter, most of all, starting requirements. They matter more than anything else. The entire RB-heavy theory is based on the fact that there's less bell-cow RBs than there are QBs who handle the ball every play, yet most leagues require starting twice as many RBs as QBs. Requiring only 1 RB, completely changes this.

 

Actually, it makes no difference whether we're talking 10 team, 12 team, or even 14. In one of my leagues, QBs 10-14 ended up with the following pts by year's end: 264, 263, 248, 246, 246. That's barely more than 1 pt per game difference.

 

I do, however, agree with the silliness in validating any draft strategy on the basis of getting good players much later than you would if you were drafting against skilled players.

[BrooklynCrew]

You are missing his point entirely.

 

He is saying it is 'safer' to find a top 10 QB in the later rounds and use the earlier rounds to draft the RBs that have the highest chances of succeeding ...

 

I'm not missing that point. I'm saying it's wrong. Drafts are changing and top qb's are going earlier. It's not that easy to get a top qb late in the draft anymore. I see people taking qb's earlier and earlier in my leagues, because of all the reasons cited. There are more busts early among rb's than ever before. The theory that it's safer going RB early and QB late is not true. I'm not missing that point, I think it's false and based on theories from 10 years ago.

[MothAudio]

In our league Fitz is 11th overall in scoring.