Bob Henry has been the New England Patriots of the Experts Poll competition in the pages of Fantasy Football Index magazine. He won a pair of titles, but they were both a long time ago – back in the 2002-2003 seasons.
Henry just got his long-awaited 3rd title. The veteran writer for Footballguys.com did so decisively, finishing with almost 3,000 more points than anyone else.
Henry got off to a slow start, finishing 9th and 17th in the kicker and defense categories. But he was on fire in the money categories, ranking 1st in tight ends, 2nd in wide receivers, 3rd in running backs and 2nd in quarterback. That’s remarkably impressive.
Henry joins Scott Pianowski of Yahoo! Sports as the only three-time winners of this competition (which has been around since 1991).
Michael Nazarek of Fantasy Football Mastermind took 2nd place, and he also compiled a very well-rounded scorecard, ranking in the top 8 in all six categories.
Micah James of FFMagicMan took 3rd.
| EXPERTS POLL, FINAL STANDINGS (standard) | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Rk | Entry | QB-RB-WR-TE-PK-Def | Points |
| 1. | Bob Henry | 2-3-2-1-9-17 | 305,020 |
| 2. | Michael Nazarek | 7-4-8-2-5-8 | 302,297 |
| 3. | Micah James | 8-7-17-3-1-9 | 300,914 |
| 4. | Mike Clay | 15-2-10-8-3-15 | 299,934 |
| 5. | Tom Deskovitz | 6-6-11-4-16-2 | 299,535 |
| 6. | Michael Livengood | 13-1-12-11-11-4 | 299,032 |
| 7. | Alan Satterlee | 4-5-9-20-2-13 | 298,889 |
| 8. | Scott Sachs | 1-15-18-6-13-1 | 298,188 |
| 9. | David Dorey | 5-14-4-15-7-20 | 297,922 |
| 10. | Sam Hendricks | 3-8-14-16-12-18 | 297,849 |
| 11. | Bryan Hough | 19-9-1-14-6-7 | 296,114 |
| 12. | Chris Liss | 10-12-16-7-18-3 | 295,886 |
| 13. | Scott Pianowski | 12-17-7-5-17-10 | 295,219 |
| 14. | L'Roy Anthony Hale | 17-11-6-10-15-6 | 295,078 |
| 15. | Cory Bonini | 14-18-15-13-8-16 | 293,771 |
| 16. | Paul Charchian | 9-16-5-19-14-12 | 293,585 |
| 17. | Michael Fabiano | 18-10-19-9-10-14 | 293,361 |
| 18. | Lenny Pappano | 20-13-3-12-20-11 | 290,874 |
| 19. | Tony Holm | 11-19-20-17-4-19 | 289,858 |
| 20. | Bill Enright | 16-20-13-18-19-5 | 289,200 |
The top 11 finishers win berths in the Mock Draft that will be run out of the magazine (joined by the winner of the Fantasy Index Super League). Henry won the poll, so he’ll get first choice of which draft pick he would prefer in a sine-wave draft.
Michael Nazarek will get first choice of the 11 spots that are left, and so on.
The Experts Poll field includes two at-large berths, awarded to the top finishers in the Fantasy Index Open competition (like the Experts Poll, only open to anyone who wants to enter). The qualifiers through that route fared well, finishing 5th and 6th. In the past two years, the Fantasy Index Open winners have finished just 14th.
We experimented with a new scoring system this year – the Chris Liss system, where there’s a floor at each position. In that format, contestants are given some relief for blown picks like Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson and Dennis Pitta. In that one, the worst you can do at QB, TE, K or D is 20th (then picks just count as zero). The threshold is lowered to 40th at RB and WR, since fantasy teams start more of those players.
In the Floor Scoring System, Henry and Nazarek were still the top 2 finishers.
This revised scoring system worked in favor of Scott Sachs of Perfect Season Fantasy Football , who improved from 8th to 4th, and Cory Bonini of USA Today Fantasy Football, who moved up from 15th to 7th.
The revised scoring format worked against Mike Clay of Pro Football Focus, who dropped from 4th to 9th, and Alan Satterlee, who fell from 7th to 15th.
| EXPERTS POLL, FINAL STANDINGS (floor scoring) | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Rk | Entry | QB-RB-WR-TE-PK-Def | Points |
| 1. | Bob Henry | 3-4-8-1-9-14 | 94,388 |
| 2. | Michael Nazarek | 7-2-9-2-6-11 | 93,587 |
| 3. | Tom Deskovitz | 10-6-6-3-11-2 | 93,100 |
| 4. | Scott Sachs | 1-14-18-4-12-3 | 92,609 |
| 5. | Michael Livengood | 14-1-14-12-16-5 | 91,866 |
| 6. | Micah James | 9-9-17-5-5-6 | 91,811 |
| 7. | Cory Bonini | 2-15-15-10-1-4 | 91,741 |
| 8. | Sam Hendricks | 6-5-13-14-14-17 | 91,724 |
| 9. | Mike Clay | 15-3-7-7-8-13 | 91,641 |
| 10. | Bryan Hough | 16-7-1-16-10-8 | 91,474 |
| 11. | David Dorey | 5-16-2-15-2-20 | 91,363 |
| 12. | L'Roy Anthony Hale | 12-11-4-13-19-9 | 90,738 |
| 13. | Scott Pianowski | 8-18-3-6-17-12 | 90,292 |
| 14. | Chris Liss | 11-13-19-8-18-1 | 90,209 |
| 15. | Alan Satterlee | 4-10-11-20-3-16 | 90,045 |
| 16. | Michael Fabiano | 13-8-16-11-7-19 | 89,873 |
| 17. | Lenny Pappano | 20-12-10-9-20-10 | 88,414 |
| 18. | Paul Charchian | 18-17-5-19-15-15 | 87,827 |
| 19. | Bill Enright | 19-20-12-17-13-7 | 85,672 |
| 20. | Tony Holm | 17-19-20-18-4-18 | 84,796 |
There really is no perfect way to score these entries, and there’s plenty of chance and luck involved in this kind of format. David Dorey, Scott Pianowski and Chris Liss, for example, have had a lot of successful seasons over the years, but they all finished in the bottom half this time around.
Mostly the poll is a way to toss the names out there, average the various draft boards, and then engage in some dialogue (given readers a chance to see how each expert is thinking about his rankings).
—Ian Allan