Fantasy football strategy, rankings, and podcasts

On our first fantasy football podcast of 2016 we invite special guests Graham Sell and Shawn Foss into the studio for a look at the new draft class and the big free agent moves of the 2016 off-season. Should Ezekiel Elliot really be the 1st overall pick in dynasty drafts? Will Paxton Lynch step up to the plate in Denver right away or could Mark Sanchez run away with the job? With only a few months left until the regular season starts up it's important to get as much background as you can on these guys!

(Listen to the Fantasy Football Podcast: 5/3/16, NFL Draft 2016 Rookies & Free Agents)

Subscribe to our podcast on iTunes to get notifications whenever we release a new episode. We also broadcast the shows live at http://www.mixlr.com/drinkfive on Tuesday nights at 8:30pm CT. Feel free to browse over and join in the discussion in the chat room!

Every week there are certain surprises and disappointments that can really throw us off guard as fantasy owners and strategists. But I am a firm believer that keeping on top of these with good analysis and projecting what results will be down the line can be the difference for your fantasy team and propel you to the playoffs. Each week we'll find a couple such instances during the games and point out the important things that you may have missed along the way.

Being a Pittsburgh Steelers fan, of course I'm going to bring up what was quite an amazing performance by the Steelers on Sunday against the Colts. Despite the medicore showings that the Steelers have had in the first several weeks of the 2014 NFL season, Week 7 and 8's match-ups have shown that their offense is clicking and the defense is starting to figure out who they are. First, Ben Roethlisberger enjoyed what was easily his best regular season performance of all time.. putting up 522 yards and 6 TD's. That's just a few yards shy of the best statistical performance from an NFL quarterback in the history of the league. We know that Le'Veon Bell and Antonio Brown are every week plays for fantasy owners, but does this mean that Roethlisberger should be looked at as a top 10 QB going forward? He's currently the #7 QB overall in standard scoring leagues after this Sunday and I think he'll end the year at the bottom of the top 10. The only QB to have thrown for more yards than him this year is Andrew Luck. Markus Wheaton was a popular pick as a WR sleeper before the season started and is still a part of the offense, but the chemistry between him and Big Ben has yet to impress. With 6'4" rookie Martavis Bryant finally healthy and involved in games it looks like he'll move into the WR2 role in Pittsburgh which comes along with plenty of redzone targets and loose coverage opposite Antonion Brown. Bryant is immediately in the waiver wire discussion (owned in 10% of leagues but finishing as the #9 WR in Week 8 with 20.30 fantasy points in a standard league).

Tom Brady has quickly eliminated any doubt that we had about his 2014 season. True, he started out the year underwhelming fantasy owners even to the point of dropping him before his breakout game against Buffalo, but has since improved dramatically along with other key components of the offense. It has long been known that Brady's recent successes can be tied to good games by Gronkowski - and that certainly was the case against Chicago on Sunday when The Gronk scored 3 touchdowns on 9 receptions for 149 yards. The running back situation in New England has always been up-in-the-air, and especially this year with Stevan Ridley out and Bolden not being used. It looks to me like we can safely say that Vereen and newcomer Jonas Gray will be the primary options from here on out (until injury or ball-control issues, at least), with Gray taking on Ridley's responsibilities including goal-line carries. Keep in mind that Gray nearly scored a touchdown on Sunday, and if he had (along with his 17 rushes for 86 yards) he would certainly be in the discussion for the #1 waiver wire pickup this week. The real enigma as of late has been Julian Edelman: trending down over the past few weeks, we have to wonder if his role (so crucial last year to the Patriot's success) has been cannibalized by a healthy Gronkowski and the emergence of Brandon LaFell (at least 4 receptions over the past 3 games including 3 TD's, last game was 11 for 124 and 1 TD). LaFell is also definitely in the waiver wire discussion this week (only owned in 35% of leagues, #11 WR in Week 8 with 18.40 fantasy points in a standard league).

Admittedly I was down on Mark Ingram a bit for several reasons.. first, I don't like playing players when just coming back from injury and second, the two defenses that Ingram performed well against at the beginning of the season (Atlanta and Cleveland) have graded out to be absolutely terrible against running backs over the course of the year so far (giving up over 1000 rushing yards each and a combined 20 TD's on the ground). Ingram turned out to be a terrific fantasy asset on Sunday night, rushing 24 times for 172 yards and 1 TD and adding 1 reception for 3 yards. So, should we be slotting him into lineups each week from here on out? First of all, he should be owned in all leagues.. he is currently owned in only 69% of Yahoo fantasy leagues and if he is available he should be your first pickup this week without question. Let's temper ourselves a bit, though, and look deeper into the situation: Ingram is currently without any competition in the backfield because Khiry Robinson and Pierre Thomas are both out with injuries. According to the most recent news, both should also miss Friday's contest against the Panthers leaving Ingram with the unquestioned primary role once more and making him a RB1 for the match-up against a soft Carolina rushing defense. Travaris Cadet is an intriguing player who is also getting more time on the field now as the passing down specialist (4 receptions for 40 yards on Sunday night) but is no threat to Ingram's job and should fade back into the background when Pierre Thomas is able to resume play. The one thing that I want to caution about after all of this good news, is that the Packers were also bad against the rush.. which means that although I think Ingram will be great against the Panthers on Thursday, he still has yet to play a team of any real skill against running backs. In weeks 10-13 the Saints will face up against the 49ers, Bengals, Ravens and Steelers.. all teams that are much better equipped to stifle his production. When Thomas and Robinson return (as early as week 10), we'll also see a return to the Saints' 3-headed RB committee. What does all of this mean? Well.. play Ingram this week, but try as hard as you can to push him in a trade before his fantasy production falters in the coming weeks.

Let’s get ready for some football! In our discussion we’ll mostly be talking about standard leagues unless otherwise mentioned. But, in general, just keep in mind that pass-catching RBs will be slightly more valuable in PPR leagues and we’ll all be on the same page!

So last week we analyzed both the overvalued and undervalued QBs in the NFL this season by taking a quick look at our rankings for those players vs. the ECR (expert consensus ranking from fantasypros.com) and ADP (average draft position) that the players are currently going at. This week we’ll attempt to do the same thing with RBs.

(Listen to the Fantasy Football Podcast, 8/25/15: The Preseason RB Show!) 

I say attempt, because with any offensive positional player in the NFL that is not a QB the variance is going to be higher and depend a lot more on outside factors than for quarterbacks. Not to mention the fact that the likelihood or injury goes up substantially for these players, RB especially.

John Paulsen (of 4for4.com) recently wrote an insightful column about this very subject. In trying to determine whether or not wide receivers are safer picks at various points in the draft, he crunched quite a few numbers. Ultimately, his research seems to indicate that although the top 2 RBs in any given year will generally outperform any of the other WRs in the draft, the drop-off after that point favors WR value until later rounds. For example, over the last 10 seasons (after the top 2 RBs have been taken out of the equation) 5 of the next 7 receivers offer relative value (difference between points scored and points scored by a baseline player at that position) above their trend line, while that is only true for 5 of the next 11 running backs.

Another interesting bit is that RBs taken just a little bit later (early 2^nd round) tend to outperform those taken in the middle of the first round (relative to their draft position). Anyway, just something to keep in mind. Let’s get back to it!

Undervalued RBs

Antone Smith - #52 on our rankings, ECR #75 and ADP #61. We value Antone more highly than a lot of our colleagues because he is a very dangerous playmaker on the field. Already 29 years old, Smith has never had a substantial amount of touches until the 2014 season and he ended the season with 366 yards and 5 TDs on only 36 touches. Unfortunately for Smith, he broke his leg toward the end of the season last year and finds himself striving for carries behind the split backfield of Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman but we know that when he gets the opportunity, he’ll make the most of it. Make no mistake, this is a flier or deep league pick only, but one that could pay off quickly should Smith see the field more than a few snaps per game.

Danny Woodhead - #25 on our rankings, ECR #42 and ADP #47. Woodhead is the little RB that could. He’s quick, scrappy and many people forget about the numbers that he put up during the 2013 season before he was injured at the beginning of 2014. In his first season on the Chargers, Woodhead rushed 106 times for 429 yards (4.0 YPC) and 2 TDs and put up 76 receptions for 605 yards and 6 TDs. Those numbers made him the #19 RB overall in standard scoring leagues in 2013. All signs point to Woodhead being healthy this year, and resuming his pre-injury role as a 3^rd down passing back and safety valve for Rivers which should lead to similar stats this year (although we will always plan for a regression from a career year).

Giovani Bernard - #18 on our rankings, ECR #28 and ADP #27. Bernard had a slight sophomore slump in 2014 and dealt with an injury toward the middle of the season. It seems that he is now firmly planted as the 3^rd down back behind Jeremy Hill, but even though we’re penciling Bernard in for less than 10 touches a game (down from the 16 that he averaged in 2014) he excels in the passing game and will certainly see more work in games where the Bengals fall behind on the scoreboard. At first glance it may appear that he is just a complementary back to Hill this season but the numbers say otherwise.

Chris Ivory - #20 on our rankings, ECR #27 and ADP #31. Ivory had some breakout performances in his first year with the Saints in 2010, but injuries held him back from being productive in subsequent years until he was traded to the Jets for the 2013 season. He has steadily improved there (putting up 7 TDs and almost 1000 all-purpose yards last year on 216 touches) and the other Jets’ RBs are underwhelming, to put it lightly (Bilal Powell, Zac Stacy, Stevan Ridley). With the recent news that Ivory may start being more active in the passing game and the current lack of quality depth at the position, we may see him in more of a 3-down role which more than warrants his position here.

Overvalued RBs

Rashad Jennings - #42 on our rankings, ECR #30 and ADP #24. Jennings had the #1 RB job for most of the 2014 season, with Andre Williams filling in at some spots and vulturing some carries as well. We’ve seen Jennings perform well, putting up 4.5 YPC in 2013 for Oakland and scoring 6 TDs that same year, but unless lightning strikes for Jennings it is likely he performs closer to his middling performance last year (only 3.8 YPC) and the Giants will form some kind of committee with Shane Vereen and Andre Williams preventing too much relevant production from Jennings this year.

Bishop Sankey - #56 on our rankings, ECR #38 and ADP #42. Sankey struggled mightily in 2014 despite being basically handed the job as lead back in Tennessee (3.7 YPC and only 2 TDs on 152 carries). With rookie David Cobb and scatback Dexter McCluster also on the squad, Sankey looks to settle in to a role as the 1a of a big committee. We’ve seen Sankey on sleeper lists and as someone to target in deep drafts but I don’t see any pluses here, especially as a part of such a young offense that has yet to prove themselves (and veteran talent Hakeem Nicks and Harry Douglas don’t exactly inspire trust).

Isaiah Crowell - #43 on our rankings, ECR #33 and ADP #33. Cleveland Browns.. need I say anymore? Alright, Crowell does have a little upside having scored 8 TDs last year and averaged just more than 4 YPC, but we haven’t seen either Crowell or Terrance West (both involved in a battle of irrelevancy last year for the lead back position in Cleveland) really show well on the field, which means that rookie RB Duke Johnson could just as easily find himself with the job. Seems that the overvalued RBs we’ve discussed are all having issues solidifying a role in their respective offenses.. Crowell is no different.

Carlos Hyde - #27 in our rankings, ECR #19 and ADP #17. Here’s another tough situation: although Hyde currently replaces Gore as the RB1 in that offense (which did add Reggie Bush as a passing-down back), it’s impossible to project Hyde as a top 20 pick based on his limited demonstrated skills in the NFL. Only rushing 83 times for 333 yards (4.0 YPC) last year does not tell us much, unfortunately. Even if Hyde does get the bulk of the early down work for the 49ers, though, their personnel list has been devastated in the off-season and those losses and the change to new team management does not bode well. No, it’s more likely that their offense has to pass the ball more because they fall behind in games without a dominant defense and Bush will probably factor more into that game plan than Hyde.