A poster yesterday at Football Outsiders got the hamster rolling in my head, in making a comment about the Patriots "never missing on a top ten draft pick". Notwithstanding that the Pats have only picked in the top ten twice under Bill Belichick (Seymour in 2001 and Mayo in 2008), the comment got me thinking.
I believe it was in an earlier comment that I laid out my general thoughts on draft success. As a quick recap, here is what I remember them as;
1) If a team never misses on their first round picks, they will be a perennial playoff team. The team that springs to mind is the Baltimore Ravens of the last fifteen years. And yes, I know they won a Super Bowl, but we are making generalizations here.
2) If a team wants to get to the next level, they need to acquire a starter from each draft in the later rounds. In this case, I think of the Colts, who pair an other-worldly offense with a defense that seems to pluck guys from the depths of the draft every season.
3) To get to the cream of the crop, say a five-year run of dominance, a team needs to find at least one starter in the later rounds, and more importantly, a few Pro Bowlers have to be dug out of the later rounds. The Patriots of 2001-2007 spring most to mind in this category.
To that end, I checked Pro Football Reference's draft database, and looked at the Pats drafting success under Bill Belichick. Here is a breakdown of AVERAGE Annual Value (a PPR rating system used to compare players across history), by draft year;
2000 24.4
2001 25.1
2002 18.3
2003 36.3
2004 17.0
2005 34.1
2006 19.0
2007 6.7
2008 12.5
The 2000 draft is discolored by the fact that Tom Brady alone produced 104 career AV out of a total draft class of 159. Patrick Pass, picked in the 7th round, contributed 15 AV over a seven year Patriots career. 2001 brought Richard Seymour and Matt Light, starters from day one that contributed greatly to the Pats 2001 Super Bowl victory. These two combine for 151 out of 164 total AV for the 2001 draft. 2002 brought Daniel Graham (1st), Deion Branch (2nd), Jarvis Green (4th) and David Givens (7th), who contributed 32, 38, 22 & 28 AV respectively, as well as winning a Super Bowl MVP in Branch. The 2003 draft is, in my opinion, the cream of the crop, returning Ty Warren (1st), Eugene Wilson (2nd), Asante Samuel (4th), Dan Koppen (5th) and Tully Banta-Cain (7th), with career AVs of 44, 29, 55, 48 and 19 respectively. All of these players, with the possible exception of TBC, were key contributors in the 2003 Super Bowl. And TBC has been the Pats best pass-rusher in his second go-round with the team.
The 2004 draft was the worst draft of the Pats dynasty, returning only Vince Wilfork and Ben Watson, both 1st round picks. Not that they were not great (in Wilfork's case) or good (in Watson's case), but there were no late round wins. Wilfork and Watson contributed 46 and 29 AV respectively in their Pats careers.
The 2005 draft could also vie with 2003 for the best draft class of the decade, returning Logan Mankins (1st), Ellis Hobbs (3rd), Nick Kaczur (3rd), James Sanders (4th) and Matt Cassel (7th). These players brought 46, 25, 35, 19 and 25 AV respectively, including Cassel's saving of the Pat's season when Tom Brady was injured in week 1 of the 2008 season.
The drafting began to go downhill in 2006, with only Laurence Maroney (1st) and Stephen Gostkowski (4th) starting for the Pats. 2007 brought only Brandon Meriweather in the 1st, and 8 misses in rounds 4-7. 2008 is too early to judge, although Jerod Mayo looks very good, he stands as the only starter from that class as well.
You can trace, by draft success, the Pats "struggles" of the last three seasons. Having an elite quarterback, of Tom Brady's caliber, probably guarantees you an 8 win season, but the defensive core got old from 2005-2008, and only a second cornerback and third safety were added to the mix.
The early returns on the 2009 draft are promising, as Patrick Chung has played pretty well so far in 2010, Sebastian Vollmer has played solid for a season and a quarter, Brandon Tate has a chance at the #3 WR role and Julian Edelman looks like he could eventually grow into another Pats slot-success story. The jury is still out on other picks from 2009, like Darius Butler, Ron Brace and Tyrone McKenzie. If the Pats are to prolong their window beyond 2011, these young players will have to continue to develop.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Back in the Saddle
Just logged onto the site, and saw that the last post was from the summer of 2009. Just to let our faithful reader know, we are back in the saddle for the 2010/11 fantasy football season. Weekly player rankings and random musings to follow...
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Jim Johnson
Eagles Defensive Coordinator Jim Johnson passed away yesterday at the too young age of 68. My experience with the Eagles has been limited to the few times they played the Pats in the pre-season, and any of the post-season games they were involved in. I am not at that level of game-watching to know what schemes he was throwing out, but by God, the man's defenses always played well.
The Eagles fetish for using crappy wide-receivers has really hurt their offense this decade, and a thought passes through my mind that they may have wasted the efforts of Johnson, whose defense carried the Eagles for much of his tenure.
I never met the man, never shook his hand, and obviously was never a player for him, but by all accounts he was a good and honest man, and the passing of any of those is to be lamented.
In Madden, for Playstation, a game that by rights should have worn out long-ago from overuse, Johnson is invariably the first man to make a head coach in the offseason. Recent rumors, which were proved to be all too true yesterday, probably kept him from ever reaching that plateau. Maybe, given the relative lack of success of other brilliant one-dimensional coordinators, it is better for his legacy that he did not. In any case, the Eagles has lost a faithful servant and the NFL has lost one of its most innovative minds. Rest in Peace.
The Eagles fetish for using crappy wide-receivers has really hurt their offense this decade, and a thought passes through my mind that they may have wasted the efforts of Johnson, whose defense carried the Eagles for much of his tenure.
I never met the man, never shook his hand, and obviously was never a player for him, but by all accounts he was a good and honest man, and the passing of any of those is to be lamented.
In Madden, for Playstation, a game that by rights should have worn out long-ago from overuse, Johnson is invariably the first man to make a head coach in the offseason. Recent rumors, which were proved to be all too true yesterday, probably kept him from ever reaching that plateau. Maybe, given the relative lack of success of other brilliant one-dimensional coordinators, it is better for his legacy that he did not. In any case, the Eagles has lost a faithful servant and the NFL has lost one of its most innovative minds. Rest in Peace.
"You're All That We Have, That's Why We Won't Use You"
The Hazean has released a list of his most over-valued receivers in 2009. Number one on the list is Dwayne Bowe, a member in good standing of Matt Calvey Inc., and a resident binky of this blog.
Hazean's commentary, in its entirety;
"He put up great numbers considering the anemic nature of the Chiefs offense last year, and did it with a smodge-podge of quarterbacks. When Tyler Thigpen is chucking the rock 30 times per game and you still are pulling down fat fantasy stat lines, your hype is sure to go through the roof.
And that is what Bowe’s stock has done. Now with a more competent — at least from the early returns — quarterback behind center, Bowe is expected to elevate last year’s numbers. But that will be hard to do with no Tony Gonzalez to keep pass defenses honest and hardly a semblance of a running game. Bowe should have a good year for sure, but top-12 territory is a stretch."
Let's undress this, piece by piece, as all undressing should be done...
1) "He put up great numbers, considering the anemic nature of the Chiefs offense..."
Regardless of the wisdom of trading for Matt Cassel, or whether or not he deserved the extension he received from the Chiefs, I think we can all agree, Matt Cassel > Tyler Thigpen. Let's call this a net plus for Bowe's catch percentage of one percent.
2) "But that will be hard to do with no Tony Gonzalez..."
According to The Fantasy Men's Law of Only Being Able to Throw to One Receiver Per Play, on each pass play, only one receiver can be thrown the ball, if a forward throw occurs. Tony Gonzalez was thrown the ball 121 times last year, a prodigious amount of targets for a TE (and he deserved every one of them, by the way). With no Tony Gonzalez this year, what happens to those 121 pass attempts? If you guessed, "A ton of them will be going to Dwayne Bowe", you are ready to move to 201. Matt Cassel is not going to call a play with the tight end as the primary option, realize it is not Tony Gonzalez, and throw the ball to the center. He will look for OTHER options to fill the void left by Gonzalez, and Bowe stands ready to benefit from this increased targeting. Let's assume he receives one third of these targets, rounding down to forty.
Now, I MIGHT grant that defenses will focus extra attention on Dwayne Bowe this season (whatever the hell that cliched concept means; do you really think the defense assigned eleven guys to follow Gonzo and screamed at Thigpen that Bowe wasn't open?), and I will say, for the sake of counter-weighting my argument, that this extra "attention", drops Bowe's catch rate four percent.
Now, what does all our black-magic do to Bowe's production? Last season, he was targeted 142 times, catching the ball 59% of the time, for a total of 86 catches, 1,022 yards and 7 TDs.
If we assume everything above, he will now be targeted 182 times, catching the ball 56% of the time, which translates to; 102 catches, for 1,213 yards and 8 TDs. Is that an unreasonable stat line for a guy that has more catches in his first two seasons than Reggie Wayne had in his first THREE years (with a much, much better QB and a much better "ground game", which is apparently important for receivers). Simply put, Dwayne Bowe's career production in his first two years puts him into elite company, and it is not a stretch to say in ten years, he could be a legitimate candidate for the Hall of Fame, based on his early career trends.
Pass-catching, for a receiver, is the intersection of two events, a target, and a catch. If your team is trailing, you will be targeted more. If your QB is better, you will catch more of those targets. If your running game is cruddy, you will also be targeted more. If your defense is crap, you will be trailing more late in the game, and you will be targeted more. All of these apply for Bowe this season, as he enters his magical third season in the league. That stat line above would not surprise me in the least. I would grab Bowe in the second round in any format.
Hazean's commentary, in its entirety;
"He put up great numbers considering the anemic nature of the Chiefs offense last year, and did it with a smodge-podge of quarterbacks. When Tyler Thigpen is chucking the rock 30 times per game and you still are pulling down fat fantasy stat lines, your hype is sure to go through the roof.
And that is what Bowe’s stock has done. Now with a more competent — at least from the early returns — quarterback behind center, Bowe is expected to elevate last year’s numbers. But that will be hard to do with no Tony Gonzalez to keep pass defenses honest and hardly a semblance of a running game. Bowe should have a good year for sure, but top-12 territory is a stretch."
Let's undress this, piece by piece, as all undressing should be done...
1) "He put up great numbers, considering the anemic nature of the Chiefs offense..."
Regardless of the wisdom of trading for Matt Cassel, or whether or not he deserved the extension he received from the Chiefs, I think we can all agree, Matt Cassel > Tyler Thigpen. Let's call this a net plus for Bowe's catch percentage of one percent.
2) "But that will be hard to do with no Tony Gonzalez..."
According to The Fantasy Men's Law of Only Being Able to Throw to One Receiver Per Play, on each pass play, only one receiver can be thrown the ball, if a forward throw occurs. Tony Gonzalez was thrown the ball 121 times last year, a prodigious amount of targets for a TE (and he deserved every one of them, by the way). With no Tony Gonzalez this year, what happens to those 121 pass attempts? If you guessed, "A ton of them will be going to Dwayne Bowe", you are ready to move to 201. Matt Cassel is not going to call a play with the tight end as the primary option, realize it is not Tony Gonzalez, and throw the ball to the center. He will look for OTHER options to fill the void left by Gonzalez, and Bowe stands ready to benefit from this increased targeting. Let's assume he receives one third of these targets, rounding down to forty.
Now, I MIGHT grant that defenses will focus extra attention on Dwayne Bowe this season (whatever the hell that cliched concept means; do you really think the defense assigned eleven guys to follow Gonzo and screamed at Thigpen that Bowe wasn't open?), and I will say, for the sake of counter-weighting my argument, that this extra "attention", drops Bowe's catch rate four percent.
Now, what does all our black-magic do to Bowe's production? Last season, he was targeted 142 times, catching the ball 59% of the time, for a total of 86 catches, 1,022 yards and 7 TDs.
If we assume everything above, he will now be targeted 182 times, catching the ball 56% of the time, which translates to; 102 catches, for 1,213 yards and 8 TDs. Is that an unreasonable stat line for a guy that has more catches in his first two seasons than Reggie Wayne had in his first THREE years (with a much, much better QB and a much better "ground game", which is apparently important for receivers). Simply put, Dwayne Bowe's career production in his first two years puts him into elite company, and it is not a stretch to say in ten years, he could be a legitimate candidate for the Hall of Fame, based on his early career trends.
Pass-catching, for a receiver, is the intersection of two events, a target, and a catch. If your team is trailing, you will be targeted more. If your QB is better, you will catch more of those targets. If your running game is cruddy, you will also be targeted more. If your defense is crap, you will be trailing more late in the game, and you will be targeted more. All of these apply for Bowe this season, as he enters his magical third season in the league. That stat line above would not surprise me in the least. I would grab Bowe in the second round in any format.
Monday, June 29, 2009
The Experts Strike Again
Over on KFFL, fantasy football expert Bryce McRae informs us that Oakland Raiders TE Zach Miller is a second year tight end. If a history "expert" told you that Abraham Lincoln was the worst Chief Justice in Supreme Court history, they probably wouldn't be called an expert too much longer.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
I'm Not Sold on Lee Evans
Fantasy Football Librarian (much, much higher on the "must-read" pecking order than this rag) links today to an article about the apparent rise in value of Lee Evans, now that Terrell Owens is in town. The theory goes that a second wide-receiver that is a threat to catch the ball will "distract" attention, or will command part of the coverage, that has inhibited Lee Evans from realizing his potential. I am unsure of the central premise of this line of thought.
Last season, the Buffalo Bills attempted, collectively, 479 passes. This does not count sacks and non-designed QB runs. Lee Evans caught 63 of those passes. I don't have the catch percentage statistics from last season yet, but let's ASSUME that he caught 55% of his passes (he has never posted a very high percentage, if my memory serves, but I will validate this after I return from vacation). That would mean that he was thrown the ball about 114 times, let's call it 115 targets. That means that 364 passes were thrown to other receivers than Lee Evans last year. Now, two things will happen with this bundle of numbers that will have a countervailing impact on Lee Evans' production this season;
1) Terrell Owens will receive more targets than Josh Reed did last year
2) Opposing teams will play their #1 CB on Owens instead of Evans
The first will result in fewer targets for Evans, the second will result in a higher catch rate (presumably) for Evans. I see no reason why either should cancel the other out. If he gets 20 fewer targets, which is a moderately small estimate, he would need to improve his catch percentage by 11 points to have the same production! A dicey proposition at best. The only gain to Evan's production that I can foresee therefore, comes from one of two possibilities;
1) His catch rate improves DRAMATICALLY. By this I mean at least 15%.
2) The Buffalo offense throws the ball at LEAST 550 times. Assuming he gets 25% of targets, this would translate to 8-10 additional catches. The issue also arises that Evans only received 25% of his targets as the teams #1, what percent is reasonable to expect as the #2? For the record, he was dinged up last year, and that certainly comes into consideration, but was he lighting it up at the beginning of the season?
In summary, I don't know if I buy the angle that a #1 receiver gets a boost from another #1 receiver coming to the team. Definitionally, only one pass attempt can be made per play, and T.O is certainly going to get his share of those attempts (a much higher percentage, we can surmise, than Josh Reed got as the other receiver last year). If Terrell Owens gets as many looks as Lee Evans received last year, it is hard for me to predict an increase in production from Lee Evans, unless Buffalo is prepared to throw the ball 600 times next season.
Last season, the Buffalo Bills attempted, collectively, 479 passes. This does not count sacks and non-designed QB runs. Lee Evans caught 63 of those passes. I don't have the catch percentage statistics from last season yet, but let's ASSUME that he caught 55% of his passes (he has never posted a very high percentage, if my memory serves, but I will validate this after I return from vacation). That would mean that he was thrown the ball about 114 times, let's call it 115 targets. That means that 364 passes were thrown to other receivers than Lee Evans last year. Now, two things will happen with this bundle of numbers that will have a countervailing impact on Lee Evans' production this season;
1) Terrell Owens will receive more targets than Josh Reed did last year
2) Opposing teams will play their #1 CB on Owens instead of Evans
The first will result in fewer targets for Evans, the second will result in a higher catch rate (presumably) for Evans. I see no reason why either should cancel the other out. If he gets 20 fewer targets, which is a moderately small estimate, he would need to improve his catch percentage by 11 points to have the same production! A dicey proposition at best. The only gain to Evan's production that I can foresee therefore, comes from one of two possibilities;
1) His catch rate improves DRAMATICALLY. By this I mean at least 15%.
2) The Buffalo offense throws the ball at LEAST 550 times. Assuming he gets 25% of targets, this would translate to 8-10 additional catches. The issue also arises that Evans only received 25% of his targets as the teams #1, what percent is reasonable to expect as the #2? For the record, he was dinged up last year, and that certainly comes into consideration, but was he lighting it up at the beginning of the season?
In summary, I don't know if I buy the angle that a #1 receiver gets a boost from another #1 receiver coming to the team. Definitionally, only one pass attempt can be made per play, and T.O is certainly going to get his share of those attempts (a much higher percentage, we can surmise, than Josh Reed got as the other receiver last year). If Terrell Owens gets as many looks as Lee Evans received last year, it is hard for me to predict an increase in production from Lee Evans, unless Buffalo is prepared to throw the ball 600 times next season.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Detroit Lions Select...
I had intended to post the Detroit Lions "alternate" first overall pick prior to the draft, but have been busy at my real job, and have not had the time to post. Suffice to say, The Fantasy Men do NOT like the Matthew Stafford selection, for which a bit of a background may be in order.
There was a great article posted on Football Outsiders, I believe it was last week, talking about the "draft" (quotation marks for a reason) and its correlation to team success. A central, albeit underdeveloped tenet, of the article was that the actual draft itself is a very small part of what is generally considered to be a successful, or failed, draft.
As important, and perhaps MORE important, is the development that comes AFTER the draft. Take two players of equal talent, put them in vastly different scenarios, and the output will be vastly different. Only the very special player can rise above organizational malaise, and I haven't seen anything to lead me to believe that Matthew Stafford is that player. Simply put, I don't know (nor obviously does anyone) whether Matthew Stafford will be a great NFL player, an average player, or a complete washout. However, I DO know that the Lions do not yet have a system and the tools in place to allow him to grow to his full potential.
To that end, were the Lions to come to the light, and hire The Fantasy Men as co-GMs (or me as GM, and Steve as my coffee guy), our draft board top 5 would look like this;
1) Eugene Monroe
2) Jason Smith
3) B.J Raji
4) Aaron Curry
5) Michael Oher
I am NOT saying that these are the best 5 players in the draft, but these players, I think, provide the largest marginal return to a rebuilding Lions program. Look, no matter what the Lions do, they are not going to contend for a Super Bowl at any point in the next two years, which is both a bad thing and an opportunity, since it allows the Lions to totally clean house, and restock their cupboard for the future. I worry that picking Matthew Stafford #1 here will lead to a spiraling problem in future years, where the organization feels the need to get him "weapons", a la the Indianapolis Colts, and ignore more pressing needs. The presence of three offensive tackles in our top 5 also allows us to use some small bit of leverage in the pre-draft negotiations. The contract handed over to Matthew Stafford will probably never be justified from the Lions end, since they are paying something like $9-13mm real value every year, for a QB that alone will not be able to fix their woes.
The Lions had a real chance to begin the long turnaround process this weekend, and I am afraid they chose poorly...
There was a great article posted on Football Outsiders, I believe it was last week, talking about the "draft" (quotation marks for a reason) and its correlation to team success. A central, albeit underdeveloped tenet, of the article was that the actual draft itself is a very small part of what is generally considered to be a successful, or failed, draft.
As important, and perhaps MORE important, is the development that comes AFTER the draft. Take two players of equal talent, put them in vastly different scenarios, and the output will be vastly different. Only the very special player can rise above organizational malaise, and I haven't seen anything to lead me to believe that Matthew Stafford is that player. Simply put, I don't know (nor obviously does anyone) whether Matthew Stafford will be a great NFL player, an average player, or a complete washout. However, I DO know that the Lions do not yet have a system and the tools in place to allow him to grow to his full potential.
To that end, were the Lions to come to the light, and hire The Fantasy Men as co-GMs (or me as GM, and Steve as my coffee guy), our draft board top 5 would look like this;
1) Eugene Monroe
2) Jason Smith
3) B.J Raji
4) Aaron Curry
5) Michael Oher
I am NOT saying that these are the best 5 players in the draft, but these players, I think, provide the largest marginal return to a rebuilding Lions program. Look, no matter what the Lions do, they are not going to contend for a Super Bowl at any point in the next two years, which is both a bad thing and an opportunity, since it allows the Lions to totally clean house, and restock their cupboard for the future. I worry that picking Matthew Stafford #1 here will lead to a spiraling problem in future years, where the organization feels the need to get him "weapons", a la the Indianapolis Colts, and ignore more pressing needs. The presence of three offensive tackles in our top 5 also allows us to use some small bit of leverage in the pre-draft negotiations. The contract handed over to Matthew Stafford will probably never be justified from the Lions end, since they are paying something like $9-13mm real value every year, for a QB that alone will not be able to fix their woes.
The Lions had a real chance to begin the long turnaround process this weekend, and I am afraid they chose poorly...
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