We are still trying to crown someone King of the Experts through our First Annual Analyzing the Experts Competition. We have our experts, me representing Average Joe owner, a surging fantasy team, and a bunch of numbers for your enjoyment. For all the readers who continue to send in feedback, good and bad, as well as suggestions for next year, I want to thank you. If FFToday will have me back, I am already planning next years’ bigger and better contest. Your ideas are always welcome and, if our contest is to be as good as possible, those comments are needed. Enough of next year; let’s see how our experts did in the sixth week of our competition, which corresponds to Week Ten of the NFL.

Our rankings through five weeks:

The Team

Dropped: Seahawks Defense Signed: Lions Defense

I am as surprised as everyone to find the Detroit Lions atop most fantasy defensive rankings. In the real games they still aren’t very good, however they get enough touchdowns and turnovers to overcome the number of points they typically allow. It can’t hurt to have another potentially explosive defense on the roster. Seattle’s defense was disposable, as the team’s new aerial offense will likely have a significant effect on their defensive fortunes too.

So, with a relatively unchanged line up, we enter Week 10 of the NFL season. For anyone who cares, with three straight wins, this team has risen to the top of its league, tied for first place, although still way behind in points scored. I’ll take that little bit of luck whenever I can get it.

A starting lineup consists of 1 QB, 2 RB, 2 WR, 1 TE, 1 K, and 1 Def, or eight starters and ten bench players.

These start recommendations were all taken from the experts’ published fantasy football player rankings for Week Ten. The names bolded and in blue were the most advantageous picks for the team.

Finally, no more byes at least for this team. We get to use our full complement of players a week early, as we have no one taking the week off. Derek Anderson’s match up against a tough Steelers defense understandably scared a lot of people away from him. Everyone loved Steven Jackson and Clinton Portis at running back, giving no love to the Denver backfield. Justifiably, LaMont Jordan was completely ignored and I need to drop his worthless butt for someone else and soon. We almost had a consensus at receiver as well, but FoxSports went outside the box and interestingly picked Roddy White over Torry Holt. With Todd Heap looking healthy for the first time in seemingly forever, he and Eric Johnson split the vote. Kicker was a toss up between everyone and I was the only one enamored of my new Detroit defense.

The Results

The best lineup I could have put on the field in Week Ten would have been:

• Derek Anderson
  
• Steven Jackson
  
• Selvin Young
  
• Larry Fitzgerald
  
• Torry Holt or Patrick Crayton (tie)
  
• Eric Johnson
  
• Jeff Reed
  
• Packers Defense

Anderson continues to be the story of the year at quarterback, except for some guy named Brady who seems to get all the press. Jackson was my best running back, but Young stepped up and beat out Portis, who also had a solid week. At receiver, our stud Fitzgerald continued to produce while both Holt and Crayton had good games. Todd Heap continues to confound our experts as he fights against injury and the horrible offense he is stuck in. Luck was with Reed this week and my selection of the unpopular Detroit defense didn’t help my numbers.

Now that we have a full roster to pick from, the carnage was widespread and gory. Three of our experts and Average Joe got only half their selections correct, a pretty sad showing to be sure. Going from an absolutely abysmal display of fantasy prognostication last week to an amazing one this week was ESPN. Just behind, since they get the average defensive score of 80% rather than making a pick, was FFToday, correct in six of their seven selections. I’ve been waiting for Mike at FFToday, who has been consistently in the middle of the pack, to have a couple breakout weeks and this may be the start of his run. More than any other expert, he tends to be outside of the box in his predictions and I’ve been surprised his numbers haven’t been more extreme in one direction or the other. I guess FoxSports differs from the pack pretty often too, but those divergences seldom seem to work out.

Here are the results from the sixth week of our competition:

ESPN 87.5%
FFToday 85.0%
Starters 50.0%
RotoWorld 50.0%
Yahoo! 50.0%
FoxSports 50.0%

This week represented a huge win for ESPN and FFToday. Both gained three picks on the competition, halving RotoWorld’s lead in a single week. The rest of us regressed closer and closer to the dreaded 60% success rate, at which point we become officially labeled as completely freaking clueless. The end of bye weeks and having to select eight out of eighteen players will continue to separate the experts from the clowns if this week is any indication. Or, was this just a little luck and someone else will be on top next time?

Through six weeks of our ten-week competition, the official King of the Experts standings are:

First Annual Analyzing the Experts Competition Official Standings

1. RotoWorld 75.0%
   
2. FFToday 70.0%
   
3. ESPN 68.8%
   
4. FoxSports 68.8%
   
5. Yahoo! 66.7%
   
6. Starters 64.6%

Conclusions

With the big jump by FFToday and ESPN, it looks like RotoWorld will be getting some much-needed competition. Luckily for me as Average Joe, the divide from top to bottom is still only five picks. I had the opportunity to improve my standings and failed as miserably as most of the experts this time. With four weeks left to go, it looks like things may come down to the final game. Does this mean all the experts are about the same? From my miserable results so far, it looks like these guys may have some value after all as the Starters are continuing to trail the pack by an increasing percentage each week.

I continue to be amazed by our positional success rates for the contest. I expected receiver to be a tough pick due to those players’ highly variable scores. Kicker and defense were luck picks more than anything, or at least I thought so before we started this. Those three positions have been the easiest for our experts so far though.

QB: 56%
RB: 69%
WR: 78%
TE: 53%
K: 72%
Def: 77%

The personnel involved are part of this of course. Anderson or Kitna at quarterback? Tough call most weeks. Our abundance of good running backs makes for another challenging selection. Add in Heap’s continuing issues and our numbers are deeply slanted by the players involved.

With four weeks to go, some of the experts are making their move while others continue to wallow in mediocrity, but it is still anyone’s to win. We will have to see who really wants it more and is willing to put in the extra effort crunching numbers on their spreadsheets, staying up into the wee hours of the night analyzing game film and dissecting statistical deviations. I am still not convinced the experts provide a whole lot of help, but our Starters are lagging, making it look more and more like professional guidance is beneficial to us Average Joes.