Week 13
12/11/09
Every industry has experts; those sages that dispense wisdom
and truth from atop the mountain. In philosophy these learned men
wear long, flowing robes and an equally lengthy beard is required.
In fantasy football, a backwards ball cap, clipboard of notes, and
half empty bottle of Coors Light is more likely. But are these guys
truly experts? Do they know any better than the rest of us schmucks?
Each week Analyzing the Experts will take aim at one or more of
these so-called oracles and find out…
Thursday games make everyone’s life a little bit more difficult.
Team owners need to set their line ups before that first game, fantasy
experts must research and post their rankings online, and I have
to pull those rankings before the game starts too. This can certainly
lead to some irritating issues. I’ve been in leagues where
an owner either forgot to set his line up or got stuck at work and
completely hosed his week, giving the win away to his opponent.
Some of our Experts struggled to get their jobs done before the
deadline and I had to grudgingly give a few of them some extra time.
AOL Fanhouse posted their position rankings throughout Thursday.
FF Cafe got theirs in late the same day. Our third procrastinator
- Yahoo! - typically does a consensus ranking, but I could only
locate the early rankings from Andy Behrens, so we rolled with those.
Unfortunately for Yahoo!, Andy was a bit lazy and didn’t bother
ranking kickers. I realize they are an afterthought, but still a
necessary player in most leagues.
Everyone got their stuff done before the game began, but it was
touch-and-go for some of these clowns. I hope no one had to get
their rankings set a bit early before heading out to the sports
bar to watch with the drunken crowds. I mention it mostly because
these three competitors got a little extra time to prepare against
their opponents this week. I doubt it really matters, but I wanted
to disclose that AOL, FF Cafe, and Yahoo! are a bunch of freaking
slackers.
A second issue that sometimes arises with these early games is
the tendency for injuries and other problems to come up after
the rankings are submitted and tabulated. This means that all
of our Experts posted their rankings based on the expectations
that DeAngelo Williams would be playing against the Bucs and that
the decrepit John Carney would still be struggling to kick thirty-yard
field goals for the Saints. Neither of these happened as Williams
was a late inactive and Carney spent Sunday on the shuffleboard
courts while Garrett Hartley did the kicking. Luckily, these issues
affected all of our Experts pretty equally and didn’t upset
the course of human civilization or our contest.
I wanted to address a question that came up repeatedly this weekend
from various readers in many different forms. My editor is going
to kill me, but I will try to be as PC as possible.
Reader: *** ****** quit competing in Analyzing the Experts? Why?
And how to did you allow this to happen?
Me: Yes, an Expert I am not allowed to name bowed out of our
race to be King of the Experts. If it was completely up to me,
quitting wouldn’t be an option (regardless of how much they
cried, whined, or threatened), but my editor is a much kinder
and gentler soul who actually cares about other peoples’
feelings. Plus, he’s the guy they write to after I tell
‘em to get bent. The Expert I am not allowed to talk about
anymore displayed to us all everything we really needed to know
about their knowledge, ability, and self-respect, so further ridiculing,
while enjoyable, won’t get us anywhere…And that is
about all I can say about the subject without my editor calling
me again. I highly recommend you contact our quitter Expert and
ask them for an explanation if I haven’t provided enough
information.
Nick owns our team this week, which is named ‘Travis Henry
is My Dad’. Awesome! Our owner is a fantasy junkie from
way up north, and I mean WAY up north. While he currently resides
in the relatively tropical climate of Hamilton, Ontario (current
temperature 34 degrees), next month he is moving to Yellowknife,
where it is currently a balmy minus eight degrees. God I love
Florida…To highlight how much Nick loves fantasy sports,
when the NHL was locked out a while back, their fantasy league
bet on a weather pool where they predicted the over/under on temperature
for five random cities in Canada each week. Sad but true. Silly
Canadians…
- QB: Cassel, Flacco, Rodgers
- RB: Addai, M. Bell, Hightower, Sproles, D. Williams
- WR: Avery, Chambers, Garcon, Jones (GB), Mason, Meachem
- TE: Carlson, Celek
- K: Carney, Stover
- Def: Bills, Broncos
Once again, this is a very realistic fantasy team at this point
in the season. There is an obvious pecking order at most positions,
although wide receiver is a bit of a crapshoot. We already talked
about the inactivity of Williams and Carney. Nick scored a solid
80 for his rankings and I didn’t let him swap out Carney
either, even though he emailed me over the weekend telling me
he had dropped the old man for Hartley. Nice pick up, but we have
to be fair.
Week Thirteen’s Games
| Pick Color Codes |
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| Correct |
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| Missed by: 1 |
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| Missed by: 2 |
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| Missed by: 3 |
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TPts |
| Correct |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
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| FF
Toolbox |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
5 |
3 |
4 |
2 |
3 |
6 |
4 |
5 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
84 |
| NFL |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
4 |
1 |
4 |
5 |
2 |
NR |
3 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
84 |
|
It’s been a while since we had any ties, so I guess we were
due. I definitely need to make some adjustments to the scoring system
next season so we don’t get any of these. Ties suck. Both
of these competitors did pretty well, beating our team owner handily.
Not surprising for FF Toolbox and a bit of a shock for NFL Fantasy,
but they have come on strong over the last five weeks. Too little,
too late for them.
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D.
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G
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J
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M
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M
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C
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C
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C
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S
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B
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B
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TPts |
| Correct |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
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| FF
Sharks |
3 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
3 |
5 |
4 |
1 |
6 |
4 |
5 |
3 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
74 |
| Yahoo! |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
4 |
1 |
4 |
5 |
3 |
NR |
1 |
2 |
NR |
1 |
NR |
NR |
2 |
1 |
81 |
|
Yahoo! continues trying to climb out of that dark, embarrassing
basement they spent most of the season in. NFL and Yahoo! both have
been on a year-end roll, almost returning to respectability. Derrick
Mason killed both of these Experts and Garcon added insult to injury
for the Sharks. Even will all of Yahoo!’s not ranked players,
these were still better this week.
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D.
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A
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C
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G
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J
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M
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M
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C
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B
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TPts |
| Correct |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
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| FB
Guys |
2 |
3 |
1 |
3 |
4 |
2 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
5 |
6 |
3 |
4 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
68 |
| CBS |
NR |
2 |
1 |
2 |
4 |
3 |
5 |
1 |
5 |
3 |
2 |
6 |
1 |
4 |
NR |
1 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
76 |
|
These are arguably the two best teams in the West Division and I
had high expectations for this match up as a precursor to some great
playoff games. Unfortunately, both of them failed miserably and
Football Guys managed the low score for the week. That ballsy call
on Chris Chambers is looking pretty stupid now.
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D.
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G
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J
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M
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M
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C
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C
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C
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B
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B
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TPts |
| Correct |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
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| FF
Café |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
3 |
1 |
3 |
5 |
2 |
6 |
1 |
4 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
80 |
| AOL |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
6 |
4 |
5 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
NR |
2 |
1 |
76 |
|
We can’t criticize the DeAngelo Williams pick since his benching
happened late in the week. But what happened with Sproles, Chambers,
Mason, and Meachem? Team owners would have been better off with
random guesses rather than listen to our Experts this week.
| |
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D.
W
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A
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C
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G
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J
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G
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M
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M
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C
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C
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C
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S
t
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B
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B
r
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TPts |
| Correct |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
|
| Rotoworld |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
4 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
6 |
1 |
5 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
76 |
| ESPN |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
4 |
3 |
5 |
1 |
5 |
2 |
3 |
NR |
1 |
4 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
74 |
|
Another ugly game here. It also eliminated ESPN from playoff contention.
Looking back over the picks from the start of our contest through
the present week, we’ve never seen so many different receivers
ranked as #1 by our various competitors. Four of the six receivers
were ranked best by at least one Expert. Avery got ranked at #2
in one case and Jones went anywhere from third to not ranked at
all. It is startling how differently all of these supposed Experts
can rank just six players.
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M
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C
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B
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B
r
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TPts |
| Correct |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
|
| KFFL |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
4 |
3 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
1 |
4 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
76 |
| Fox |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
5 |
4 |
3 |
1 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
76 |
|
Even KFFL got in on the winning action this week. Well, not really,
but at least they didn’t lose for a change. The quarterback
position was cake, but everything else was a mess. KFFL for some
reason had Celek ranked towards the bottom of their tight ends.
I have no idea why, as there wasn’t any significant injury
concerns for him or anything else. Weird, but we’ve come to
expect things like this from KFFL.
| |
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M
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C
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C
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C
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S
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B
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B
r
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TPts |
| Correct |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
|
| FF
Today |
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
5 |
3 |
4 |
1 |
4 |
2 |
6 |
5 |
1 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
|
|
73 |
|
FF Today got the easy win this week since they were scheduled to
play the crybaby Expert who quit. Everything was all set up for
them to snap up the last playoff spot. FF Sharks had lost. ESPN
had blown their chance. FF Today just needed the win (which they
got by default) and to score three points more than the Sharks.
And the Sharks outscored them by one. So close…
| ATE Week 13
Standings - East |
| EAST |
Record |
Pts |
| * Rotoworld |
8-5 |
1062 |
| * Fox |
7-3-3 |
1064 |
| e FF Cafe |
5-5-3 |
1058 |
| e ESPN |
5-5-3 |
1053 |
| e AOL |
3-7-3 |
1044 |
| e KFFL |
2-9-2 |
1024 |
| ****** |
3-10 |
953 |
|
|
| ATE Week 13
Standings - West |
| WEST |
Record |
Pts |
| * CBS |
9-2-2 |
1060 |
| * Football Guys |
8-4-1 |
1056 |
| * FF Toolbox |
7-3-3 |
1080 |
| FF Sharks |
6-5-2 |
1044 |
| e FF Today |
6-5-2 |
1041 |
| e Yahoo! |
4-8-1 |
1056 |
| e NFL |
4-6-3 |
1055 |
|
|
* – Clinched a playoff spot
e - Eliminated from playoff contention.
The regular season is now over and it’s time to gear up for
our three-game playoff run. One of our six remaining contestants
will be anointed King of the Experts and can proudly make up a crown
out of cardboard and wear it around the office. I don’t get
paid enough to provide any tangible rewards.
Our contenders and their seeds:
- CBS
- Rotoworld
- FB Guys
- FF Toolbox
- Fox
- FF Sharks
In the upcoming week, CBS and Rotoworld, as our divisional winners,
get a bye while seeds three and six square off as do seeds four
and five. That only gives us two games to talk about, but we’re
also going to start pulling apart some of the data that has been
accumulating over the course of our regular season and see what
we might be able to glean from all of it.
To all the teams who are now finished, remember it’s not
whether you win or lose, but how badly you sucked that really
matters. There is nothing wrong with being average; most people
fall into that category themselves. It’s those commentators
who are truly horrific yet hold themselves out as real Experts
that deserve the bulk of our scorn. Over the remaining few weeks
we have together, not only will we determine a winner, but we
will also try to figure out what went wrong for each of our other
contestants. Man crush on a particular player? Too many outside
the box picks? General incompetence? All of these tags will likely
be applied to one or more of our failed Experts.
Meanwhile, our playoff games have some suspense, too. Football
Guys is the sole remaining hope for our pay sites to retain any
semblance of respectability. Will they fall to the underdog FF
Sharks? And Fox Sports has a huge corporate backing with a payroll
to match. Can FF Toolbox use its indie skills (whatever those
are) to beat them?
|
