Ian Allan answers your fantasy football questions. In this edition. Will Marcus Mariota be another Cam Newton? Which is the better fantasy format -- head-to-head or total points? Is Ben Roethlsiberger the steal of the year at quarterback? And working in previous years results to adjust auction values.
Question 1
What is your thinking about Marcus Mariota and his comparison to Cam Newton as rookie QBs? Could Mariota do Newton's numbers as a rookie? Both run, average throwers. I think Mariota is a better thrower than Newton and has better WRs and TE.
CRAIG LEEDY (Sacramento, CA)
Cam Newton, Robert Griffin III, Andrew Luck, Russell Wilson. We should all be careful not to underrate rookie quarterbacks who can run. Mariota in that way fits in with those groups. He put up great running numbers at Oregon, and the physical ability is there. He ran a 4.52 at the combine. But I don’t agree with the assessment that he’s working with better receivers. That Carolina team had Steve Smith, and he’s better than anybody Tennessee has right now. And I’m not ready yet to say that Mariota is better than Newton as a passer. I remember Newton as a rookie hitting on a lot of big downfield passes; he averaged over 13 yards per completion.
Question 2
This is the 26th year. (I've relied on Fantasy Football Index for most of them! ). We've tweaked our format and scoring through the years, but the essential core has remained the same. One of the constants has been that we've always determined our league champ by overall points. Years ago we incorporated head to head, but it was only as a supplement. The main payouts remained based on overall points. The H2H lost steam and we got rid of it. We then added a weekly high payout to keep all team owners interested in the event they fell way behind in overall points relatively early in the season. This system has worked well and everyone, for the most part, stays engaged throughout the season. My question is simply this: Why the fascination with H2H? All serious fantasy football players put a ton of time and energy into preparing for their drafts and monitoring their teams throughout the season. Obviously, there is a large "luck" factor in FF (e.g., injuries, suspensions, kneeling at the 1 yard line, etc.) Why add to that the "randomness" of a H2H schedule and the determination of what team you play in a given week. There is simply no added strategy in H2H. It's not like, "Oh I'm playing Joe this week, so I better play a RB as my flex, but if I was playing Mike I'd play a WR instead." You're going to play the squad you think is going to score the most points that week irrespective of who your opponent is. We've all heard of or experienced ourselves the season where we had the best team/scored the most points but failed to make the playoffs because we had multiple losses to teams that had their best week of the year. It seems so silly and a further reward of luck, instead of rewarding the owner that drafted the best and managed their team the best throughout the year. Moreover, the fact that points at the end of the year (fantasy playoff time) are worth more than earlier than the season is absurd. More "randomness." What am I missing?
Dave Tutas (Grand Rapids, MI)
I prefer the head-to-head format. I like going into each week trying to put together a plan to emerge with a victory. Each week you’ve got about a 50 percent chance of finishing with a win or a loss, and your job is to manage your roster to try to tweak the odds in your favor. Maybe you pick up a defense or a kicker off waivers because you like the matchup. I have played in the total points format many times, but it doesn’t have the same thrill. Way too often, I think, it’s pretty clear halfway through the season which team is going to win. Or by early October, it’s a two-team race. Too many of the other teams and weeks then become irrelevant. Giving a weekly prize for a high score doesn’t do enough to fix this issue. If my team is already out of the running, what are the odds that I’ll be able to outscore 11 other teams in any given week. I suppose in that kind of format, many teams in many weeks would try the double-up strategy – starting both a quarterback and a wide receiver from the same team, hoping they could hit on a couple of touchdowns to lift said team to the top of the heap. I am in agreement that points are meaningful. In our league, we have head-to-head, division titles and wild-card berths, but we also agree that scoring title is significant. That’s an achievement we recognize, and it’s a very nice consolation award if your team isn’t fortunate enough to have the hot hand in those key weeks at the end. Ideally, you finish with a rare Triple Crown – best record, scoring title and a win in the championship game.
Question 3
How do you use past data in auctions? For instance if you know in the past four years the going rate for RB and QB is a few bucks higher consistently than the sheet you worked out, how do you adjust, or should you even? I get better WR and many lesser (rank 20 and under) RBs and QBs as values, but not having top shelf RBs really hurts. What is your take, would you pay the going rate for better RBs and QBs like everyone else in this league?
Robert Taylor (Omaha, NE)
I need to do a better job of fusing in past results – expected results, if you will. Every year in the Mock Auction (in the magazine) I calculate the player values as if all 12 teams were operated by Ian Allans. I haven’t thought much about who the other 11 owners were or what they were trying to do. And that approach is fine to a point. I’ve won that league three times, I believe, which is more than anybody. So what I’m at least having some success. But in each of the last two years, I’ve been left at the end trying to account for quarterbacks going for a lot less than I thought they were worth. In each of those auctions, I’ve bought guys for amounts that were pretty good, only to see much better buys later on. This year, for example, I bought Roethlisberger for $19, then saw Ryan and Newton go for $16 and $15 later on. If I had more carefully studied the previous years of the auction, I might have been more aware of the possibility that the better deals could be yet to come. I am hesitant, however, to start changing player prices based on what others will do. Value is value. It’s what the guys are worth. If you think Roethlisberger is worth $24, then that’s what he’s worth. You don’t change his “value” to $20 because you think he’ll go for that. Instead, you keep in mind that you might have to pay for close to value for a running back or two, and you keep in mind that the best values are going to be at quarterback and wide receiver – so you try to spend more of you money where you’ll get a better bang for your buck. At running back, if you believe people are going to overpay there, it makes you more willing to spend close to value on enough to patch that area, and then maybe you’re aware that you’ll need to pick up or trade for another running back at some point in the 17-week season.
Question 4
I like the customized scoring systems you provide on the website, though I need some help in compiling my overall draft board. In my 10-team standard scoring league, each team is required to draft two defenses. So under Auction Values, I list 20 defenses will be chosen and guesstimate that only two will be worth more than the minimum bid (because most defenses are interchangeable for fantasy purposes and all but a couple are drafted in the last two rounds). But in this scenario, Buffalo’s defense comes out as the 47th player overall. I doubt anyone in my league will draft Buffalo’s defense in the fifth round (though I’d love to be proven wrong). So I increased the number of defenses worth more than the minimum bid to 7, and then to 15, but in each case Buffalo still ranks as the 47th player overall. What do I have to do to prevent defenses from being ranked so high on my board?
Paul Owers (Lake Worth, FL)
You’ve got the right idea. You’re adjusting the right numbers. But you’re moving them in the wrong direction. There will be 20 defenses selected. That’s in stone. If you want Buffalo to be worth more, tell the computer that you want more of them to be worth more than $1. If, for example, you say that 15 of them will be worth more than $1, it will scroll down to defense No. 16, see that the Colts are projected to score 107 points, then calculate that Buffalo (130) will outscore them by 23 points. So the relative value for the Bills would then be 23 points, and they’d be ranked above all of the quarterbacks, running backs and wide receivers who project to be only 22 points (or less) better than the baseline players at their position. If you instead tell computer that you want only two defenses worth more than $1, then it will go down to Kansas City at No. 3, see that their defense should score 124 points, and instead calculate that the Bills will be worth only 6 points. This should move Buffalo well down in your rankings. When you shift the baseline to 10-15 defenses, all of those units should move way up. I’m not sure of your exact scoring system, but you get the idea. You could move the number of defenses worth more than $1.00 down to zero and really move the Bills down. The reality that Buffalo is staying at 47th in your rankings even when you shift the defensive baseline numbers suggests to me that you probably need to adjust the baseline numbers at the other positions (QB, RB, WR). Maybe you have only 8 QB, 19 RB and 19 WR worth more than $1.00? Then the Bills, even with a small projected value, would still at least be positive, putting them ahead of those backs and receivers in the 20s at their positive. That’s my guess. If you can’t figure it out, email me directly and we’ll figure it out. But it’s a unit with some value. Maybe your scoring system richly rewards sacks, and the Bills look very good in that area – a league-high 111 sacks in the last two years. So if they wind up being “worth” the 47th pick, maybe that’s telling you that with the highest defense going about 90th in your league each year, you should pick the Bills about 80th this year.
Question 5
Mark Ingram is causing me to lose sleep. I keep seeing him listed as a 3rd-5th round pick, but with the Saints now paying CJ Spiller $4 mil/yr, is Ingram really that valuable? I'm in a 12-team keeper league, and can keep Ingram if I give up my 6.07 pick. If he's really a 4th or 5th round talent, it's a no-brainer, I know. But why am I having problems pulling the trigger?
DAVE AMSBAUGH (West Chester, OH)
Ingram and Spiller signed identical contracts in the offseason – four years, $16 million. I think they’ll split time, with Ingram probably handling 60-65 percent of the rushing duties, and Spiller being a lot more productive in the passing game. Ingram isn’t a good receiver. Spiller, I think, can excel in those routes, so my expectation is that he’ll take on a lot of those duties that have been handled by Darren Sproles and Pierre Thomas in the past, probably catch 70-plus passes. Both of these backs might finish with about 1,100-1,200 yards. Ingram should score more touchdowns. In PPR formats, Spiller might be a slightly better choice. At the pricetag of choice 6.07, I would keep Ingram rather than hope that a better player is available in that spot.
Question 6
Is Big Ben the best value at quarterback this season?
Chuck Penza (Hammonton, NJ)
I don’t think so. After Andrew Luck and Aaron Rodgers, I think there are seven quarterbacks who look pretty much interchangeable, and I don’t sense that Roethlisberger will be selected much later than those guys. I did the Fanex FAD draft in late June, and Matt Ryan, Cam Newton and Eli Manning were all selected after Roethlisberger. In the Mock Draft in the magazine, Newton was selected after Roethlisberger. I did the Fanex Auction league a few weeks back. In that one, Newton and Roethlisberger tied for the best deal among the quarterbacks, I thought, among the top 15. I bought them both at what I believe was 72 percent of their value. In the Mock Auction league in the magazine, I bought Roethlisberger for what I thought was a pretty good deal ($19), but later Josh Obusek bought Ryan for $16 and John Barrett bought Newton for $15; I thought those deals were better. Ryan and especially Newton, I think, will be better values than Roethlisberger. Then, if you dip just out of the top 10, I think Joe Flacco might be an even better value.
Question 7
I have Wes Welker in a keeper league. Would you recommend holding on or cutting him loose?
KEVIN KNIGHT (Stillwater, OK)
I don’t think anyone will sign Welker. I don’t think he’s good enough anymore, and he’s also had the issues with concussions, which will scare away a lot of teams.
Question 8
Long-time subscriber. Love the magazine and updates. You have C.J. Anderson from Denver ranked pretty high. Aren't you concerned about four new starters on the O-line?
MARK COLON (Byron Center, MI)
That’s a good point. But the Broncos have Peyton Manning, and he helps to make offensive lines look good. With his quick decision making, he doesn’t tend to get sacked often (even if the line actually isn’t that good). And with Manning consistently moving the ball through the air, that tends to make things easier for the running game – fewer eight-man fronts and whatnot. Also factor in that the Broncos brought in Gary Kubiak in the offseason. Kubiak did a remarkable job last year in Baltimore. In 2013, the Ravens had all kinds of problems with their offensive line, averaging only 3.1 yards per carry. Primarily with scheme changes, Kubiak was able to get that average up to 4.5 yards per attempt last year, with the team running for 691 more yards.
Question 9
Who should I keep? You give up the round the player was selected the prior year. I am allowed to keep four players (which includes one player who was a rookie the prior year). I am allow to keep a player twice before I lose their rights. Options are: Lacy (3, kept once), A.Brown (4, kept once), G.Bernard (6 kept once), G.Olsen (7), S.Watkins (9), Ingram (9), T.West (11), Jeffery (12, kept once), O.Beckham (18), Kelce (18), Moncrief (18), M.Bryant (18).
John Evans (Pensacola, FL)
Odell Beckham and Travis Kelce, who might both be top-3 players at their position, are easily your two best keeper, given that they come at the cost of just an 18th-round pick. Given that nice start, I think I’d go into 2015 loaded for bear. Eddie Lacy and Antonio Brown might both be top-5 overall players, so I believe I’d go with them with my other two spots. You will lose both of them at the end of the 2015 season, but I think this looks like a year where you should be gunning for the championship. Watkins, Ingram, Jeffery and Moncrief are the other guys that catch my eye, but you only get to keep four, and I don’t see how they would fit in.
Question 10
In a 24 team league, standard scoring, no ppr. I have the 22nd pick, no snake draft or anything else, so I have the same pick every round. I can keep up to 2 players, drafted after the second round of last year, and in doing so I forfeit a supplemental 3rd rounder (between round 3 and 4) and a supplemental 4th rounder (between rounds 4 and 5). Those picks for me will be approximately #94 and #142, so I think it makes sense to keep two. My question is, I can keep two out of Lamar Miller, Carlos Hyde, and Joseph Randle. I'm thinking Lamar Miller is a sure thing, but who will be the better back this year out of Randle and Hyde?
RON SAYER (Salem, OR)
Agree that Miller is a sure thing. For the other one, we’ll see what the guys do in the preseason, but right now I would proceed as if it will be Randle. To win a 24-team league, you need to hit a home run somewhere along the line, and Randle could be your home run. He should be the starting back for the Cowboys, and he might put up really big numbers running behind that offensive line. I loved what he did in his limited work last year.
Question 11
I've been a regular subscriber since 1988, and your site is still my go-to resource. Recently, I have begun playing in a few dynasty leagues; and, although there is a cheat sheet in the original yearly publication, I find it frustrating that there are no updates or cheat sheets for different scoring systems in a dynasty format. Since I can't just plug-in a ppr or TD only scoring system into the calculator on the website, I am left relying on just your initial opinion in the magazine and a mention or two in the team recaps to consider two months later at my draft. Do you have any plans to include other dynasty scoring system cheat sheets in the updates, or the standard scoring system cheat sheet after mini-camp and preseason performances by the rookies, maybe in place of large-print formats of the redrafts?
Shaun Hawkins (Albany, GA)
For the 2015 rankings, those feed out of a spreadsheet. I project the stats for each individual player, and those numbers can be used to create rankings in all of the different scoring systems – PPR, standard, TD-only, whatever. But the math becomes too difficult when trying to expand that format to cover entire careers. You’re getting into trying to plot out entire careers, weighing how long quarterbacks, running backs and wide receivers might last working with coaches and teammates who aren’t even in the league right now. And you’re getting into trying to decide how much of a discount to put on numbers in 2018 versus 2015. It gets very complicated – maybe impossible. So for Dynasty rankings, we do it the old-fashioned way, going down the list and picking guys more by feel. I get the 2015 rankings and the ages in front of me and try to slot them by what seems best. Last year we started working revised Dynasty rankings into the August update package for the first time, and you’ll see those rankings again this year.