8/20/08
The QB position in fantasy football is always a hot draft topic
and coming fresh off the ‘year of the QB’ that debate
is hotter than ever. My advice? Never mind those irritating wannabe
MIT grads clinging to those mythical abstract concepts they refer
to as “mathematics,” telling you not to draft a QB early.
They would have you believe that because your team in most leagues
requires two RBs and two, or even three, WRs, the difference between
RBs #1-24 and WRs #1-24 or 36 is greater on a per game scoring average
than QBs #1-12.
Those same cults of the “math” will also try and steer
you away from slot machines and state lotteries proving them to
be the superstitious hacks we all know they are. Nope, anyone who
has ever donned a jersey, real or replica, knows every team needs
a leader going in to battle and we also know it’s our QB that
is going to be the one to do it.
OK if you detected a hint of sarcasm there thin you are perceptive
enough to follow the rest of this article. I’m not going to waste
any time here telling you where and when to draft your starting
QB. It’s a personal choice as sacred as political affiliation. Instead,
let’s just look at the candidates.
Everyone’s talking about the big four this year and their not referring
to Notre Dame RBs. The Big Four of 2008 are this year’s sure-fire,
can’t-miss QBs Tom
Brady, Peyton
Manning, Tony
Romo, and Drew
Brees. While each of these players is certainly worthy of being
top rated QBs it is interesting why they are the big four. Well,
they were the top-four producers in total fantasy points scored
last year.
Are total fantasy points the best indicator of value? Notice in
the table of total points the 2nd to the last column of FPTs/G.
Big Ben was a better QB per game than three of the QBs listed ahead
of him in total scoring. The simple reason is that he only played
15 out 16 games. Total fantasy points scored in this case is not
an accurate measure or value when compared to FPTs per game.
The shortcoming of FPTs per game as an evaluation tool is that some
QBs don’t play all 16 games yet their average is determined
as if they did. If a QB only played 8 full games but their totals
are divided by 16 games then their measure is half of their true
value. Following this logic then fantasy points per game started
rather than just per game would be the best measure of true value.
It’s certainly a better measure but in falls short when evaluating
QBs like Kurt Warner that played in several games that he didn’t
start.
Some often just toss out the number of TDs passes a QB had the previous
year as the only stat that matters. Carson Palmer had 26 TDs last
year so I’m ranking him as QB # ‘x’. It’s
clean, neat, and easy. That method certainly carries more weight
in scoring leagues where only TDs matter. But TD passes don’t
account for yardage.
Others subscribe to total passing yards as a better measure than
TDs because they consider TD’s a more volatile measure and
yardage as a more consistent indicator of performance. This is a
reason you may have heard some reservations about Ben Roethlisberger
coming in to 2008. He had a high TD to yardage ratio. Interesting
theory, however looking at yds per TD ratio in a graph you may want
to re-consider. Here’s a list of the top 10 least yards per
TD pass ratio table from 2007.
If you believe Roethlisberger should be demoted on the basis
of an unusually high TD per yards passing then logic would dictate
these other QBs, most notably Tom Brady, should also take a plunge.
Romo and Manning are also members of this list so if this is a
good indicator of potential then Drew Brees is the one member
of the fab 4 to have the greatest potential upside of increasing
his scoring. I would argue that it is more a combination of several
factors such as red-zone passing efficiency, positive field position
given by the defense, and ability to sustain scoring drives rather
than racking up yardage without finishing it off with a TD.
If you are a subscriber to my recent
articles on opportunity efficiency then we can apply the same
analysis to the QB position. Once again, in looking at QBs in
fantasy football what is the single solitary question we want
to determine? How many fantasy points is this player going to
score (The 2nd question you should be asking is how consistently
will they score them, which is why you can’t miss the recently
published article from The Gut Check on Crank
Score analysis.
What Opportunity Efficiency is really providing is a possible
picture of a players worth at full value. By measuring QBs in
terms of fantasy point scoring per pass attempt we can combine
these different factors in to one value. We alleviate the problems
of games started, total points, and TDs versus yardage. Here is
the table of Fantasy Points per passing attempt (FPTs/Att) table
from 2007.
This table has Brady at the top justifying him as a true lead QB
coming in to 2008. Again, don’t read this table as a statement
of how I think the QB ranking of 2008 should finish. It is an evaluation
tool to measure past performance that is more accurate than other
indicators as I explained earlier. More simply it’s a measure
of how a player may project given an increase or decrease in opportunity.
There are certainly some fliers at the top that don’t seem
to belong like a Tim Rattay. I could easily eliminate them by requiring
a certain amount of minimum attempts but I left them on the table
to make a point. In researching whether this is a workable table
I made the same chart for 2006. Care to guess who was a top 5 flier
last season? With only a 2 game sample size Derek Anderson placed
3rd on the list of 2006. Anyone viewing that 2006 table last preseason
would have been equally skeptical to have considered Derek Anderson
as a potential high producer.
*Interesting footnote that may only matter to me. The other flier
from 2006 of most efficient producers per attempt besides Derek
Anderson…yep, Tim Rattay again. Anyone from the Bears staff
tuning in?
Here are some thoughts upon looking at this table…
Chance To Be A Top 5 Performer
Jake Delhomme
seems by all indications to be back to health after missing most
of last year. He has been a top 10 producer in his career. The
Panthers have added Muhsin Muhammad, D.J. Hackett, Jonathan Stewart,
and have improved their offensive line. I would have little hesitation
drafting him as a my starter in the mid-rounds after bulking up
on WRs and RBs but he can also be drafted as your #2 QB which
will represent great value when all is said and done this season.
Chance To Be A Top 10 Performer
David Garrard was he 16th best QB last season in total points.
It’s easy to forget he only played 12 games last season,
his first year as a starter. His lack of passing stats is often
attributed to the Jaguars being a run oriented team while forgetting
he didn’t play a quarter of the season. Increase his pass
attempts by 25% that is 406 * .68 FPTs/Att for 275-300 FPTs edging
him in to a top 10 QB.
Chance To Be A Top 15 Performer
Chris Redman
has several things going for him. He is starting the season with
little pressure as most consider it a matter of time before top
pick Matt
Ryan takes over. Anyone ever heard the Brady Quinn story?
He came back to the NFL after being an insurance salesman. Anyone
ever heard the Kurt Warner story? He’s also on a team that will
be lousy and need to pass a lot playing catch up. He’s got a 2:1
TD to INT ratio Add to that his high FPTs/Att ratio and I think
he’s a solid case for a third QB roster stash in deeper leagues.
Buyer Beware
Super Bowl winning QBs and Mike Martz QB’s. Almost always
over valued and they didn’t score well here either.
Never Mind The Numbers…
Aaron Rodgers. Don’t you just want to root for the poor
kid? Draft players you want to root for as Back-ups. He’ll
outperform Favre this year if he stays on the field in yards,
TDs, and Wins.
Jason Campbell.
If I’m searching for an overlooked QB value especially in a keeper
leagues this is my guy. He just passes the eye test and he’s going
to have 3 future stars to throw to for the foreseeable future
in Malcolm Kelly, Devin Thomas, and Chris Cooley.
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