Updates from August, 2010

  • 2008 Sleepers and undervalued players

    Brandon 8:41 am on 7/31/2008 | 9 Permalink Reply

    As the preseason approaches, as well as many of your fantasy football drafts, it’s time to write about some of the players that we recommend you target in your draft…players that most of the other owners in your league might not be thinking about (or even aware of). While making this list, I realized that a few of the players I wanted to include are not necessarily “sleeper” picks, so the list was expanded slightly to include players that are simply undervalued at their position, and that you should be able to pick up late in your draft. If you’re in a keeper league, the young players on this list usually make for good pickups, with the hope that they can become stars in the future. Even if you’re not in a keeper league though, the hope is that these players can help your team at some point in the season, if not immediately, so keep an eye on ‘em!

    Quarterbacks

    Aaron Rodgers (GB): As long as Brett Favre does not somehow weasel his way back into the starting role in Green Bay, Rodgers is primed to have a pretty solid year in Green Bay. Last season Favre managed to thrown 28 touchdowns in this offense, which other than Donald Driver, consisted primarily of players with very little experience in the offense (or the league for that matter). I expect this year that while there will be an obvious drop off at the quarterback position, all of the other players on the team should take strides forward and allow Rodgers to have a great “rookie” season. You might not want him as your QB1 going into the season, but if you’re starting him consistently from week 3 or 4 on, don’t be surprised.

    (More …)

     

  • 2008 Mock Draft v2.0

    Brandon 11:13 pm on 7/30/2008 | 5 Permalink Reply

    Over the course of the past month or so (yeah…it took that long!), we’ve been participating in another mock draft via e-mail. The draft was only four rounds and consisted of other fantasy football bloggers, including FF Librarian, FF Goat, FF Fools, Football Jabber, The Hazean, The Bruno Boys, West Coast Nonsense, Pancake Blocks, Football Burrito, Curveballs for Jesus and Football Outsiders. Here is how it went down (you’ll find analysis on the first round picks, as well as the rest of the rounds and analysis, after the jump)…

    Round 1
    1.01 Curveballs For Jesus: LaDainian Tomlinson (RB, SD)
    1.02 Football Outsiders: Adrian Peterson (RB, Min)
    1.03 Football Burrito: Joseph Addai (RB, Ind)
    1.04 Panake Blocks: Stephen Jackson (RB, StL)
    1.05 West Coast Nonsense: Brian Westbrook (RB, Phi)
    1.06 Bruno Boys: Tom Brady (QB, NE)
    1.07 The Hazean: Marion Barber (RB, Dal)
    1.08 Football Jabber: Frank Gore (RB, SF)
    1.09 Fantasy Football Fools: Clinton Portis (RB, Was)
    1.10 Fantasy Football Geek Blog: Marshawn Lynch (RB, Buf)
    1.11 Fantasy Football Goat: Larry Johnson (RB, KC)
    1.12 Fantasy Football Librarian: Randy Moss (WR, NE)

    (More …)

     

  • Update: Our expert league team

    Matt 11:37 am on 7/28/2008 | 2 Permalink Reply
    Tags: expert league

    As previously mentioned, we’re members of the Fantasy Website Drunken Pirate Slapfight Expert League (got all that? You can check out the list of websites involved here). Drafting from 10th position in a 12-team league, here’s the squad we wound up with: (More …)

     

  • ESPN Fantasy Football: A few features I like

    Matt 12:31 pm on 7/24/2008 | 4 Permalink Reply
    Tags: ,

    ESPN appears to have revamped its fantasy football website significantly, and I like what I see. I’m moving my keeper league over from Fox Sports, a hassle I’m only undertaking because I’m so impressed. The layout is simple and easy on the eyes; the only comparably clean site out there is Yahoo’s, which I refuse to use because of the inflexibility of its waiver wire system.

    ESPN has clearly put a good deal of thought into how fantasy football players use their site. The best websites work so well that you don’t have to think about them – the next thing you’re looking to do is always right there waiting for you. This is the feeling I get on ESPN.com. While I liked Fox Sports because it offered all the features I need, moving from that cluttered, clunky interface to ESPN is like taking a breath of fresh air. (More …)

     

  • Yahoo! Draft Room preview

    Brandon 11:00 pm on 7/23/2008 | 3 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , queue,

    In case you’re not one of those fantasy football addicts that can’t wait until your real league’s drafts to have a fantasy team in front of you…those who, like myself, annually sign up for a Yahoo! Public league team just so that you have something to look at for the month before your draft…I figured I’d provide you with a quick glimpse of the new and improved Yahoo fantasy football draft room:

    yahoo draft room

    As with most Yahoo fantasy football products, I think it looks nicer than any other draft room that’s offered (that I’ve seen at least). At the top of the dialog is a dynamic scrolling banner that shows which team is up to draft, along with the next teams to draft, which is pretty stylish. Below that you find a few other solid features, including an enlarged section that shows last years stats for the player you’ve currently selected, so you don’t have to venture out of the draft room to get that information. Next to the player names, you see a list where you can add players to your queue…nothing special here, but not bad either. Finally, the right side of the draft room consists of an overview of your team and a chat room. The team section is pretty well laid out and makes it easy to see exactly what your starting roster will be come the beginning of the season. Overall, I have to say that again Yahoo looks like it has the top draft room available. While it hasn’t really added any new features that I am aware of, besides maybe the bigger player stats section, they seemed to put all the focus in making it even more user friendly in terms of aesthetics and usability, which I really can’t complain about.

    In case you were interested about my team in this league, my important starters consist of Brian Westbrook, Earnest Graham/Reggie Bush, Braylon Edwards, Larry Fitzgerald and Kellen Winslow.

     

  • Quick tip: Firefox + Hyperwords

    Matt 5:02 pm on 7/23/2008 | 2 Permalink Reply

    In case you aren’t a Firefox user yet, here’s a great reason to become one: The fantastic (and fantastically simple) add-on called Hyperwords. Hyperwords allows you to select any word, name, or phrase on any page on the Web and immediately plug it into an online resource of your choice. Select an address and send it to Google Maps. Select a phone number and send it to Skype. Select someone’s pompously cryptic French expression, translate it into English to find out what it means, then never tell anyone about it in case it’s one of those expressions that everyone seems to know but you.

    There’s lots more you can do, but most important to fantasy football players is its central function: Sending your selected text to a search engine of your choice. So let’s say someone offers to trade you Ronnie Brown, and your first thought is, “What’s the deal with his knee, anyway?” Just select his name, right-click, select Google News, and there you go. Sure, you could have opened up a new window, gone to news.google.com, typed in Ronnie’s name, and thereby accomplished the same thing, but that would have cost you a whole extra five to ten seconds, which is of course simply unacceptable.

     

  • FanSoft’s Cheatsheet Creator

    Matt 3:16 pm on 7/23/2008 | 5 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , fandraft, websites

    I checked out FanSoft’s newest offering, CheatSheet Creator, today. While I was encouraged by the nice design (us web designers are suckers for pretty colors and such), I quickly realized that I’ll probably never use this unless the interface is reworked into something that’s far less of a pain in my ass. I’m actually wondering whether they’ve actually sat down and tried to use their own product to build a cheat sheet before. (More …)

     

  • Blogger league domination begins!

    Brandon 8:36 am on 7/23/2008 | 2 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , drunken pirate slapfight,

    This year FFGeekBlog has begun its infiltration into several fantasy football blogger leagues, with the plan of blogger league domination within a year or two. Currently Matt is drafting a team for a league set up by JunkyardJake.com called “Fantasy Website Drunken Pirate Slapfight Expert League”. At this point our team is looking pretty solid, with the likes of Ricky Williams and Brett Favre leading the way (no joke!), so we plan to compete with the best in that league (we also have Joseph Addai, Maurice Jones-Drew and Braylon Edwards, in case you were wondering/worried – actually, this site allows anyone to see the teams without logging in, so check out our team here). We will make sure to post the final roster when the draft is complete, which should be today or early tomorrow I would guess.

    While Matt has ultimate control over that squad, I will be taking the reigns in another blogger league, The Hazean’s second annual Blogger League, which will be hosted on FleaFlicker.com. I just found out this morning that we have the 10th pick (out of 12 teams) in that league, so I can begin my preparation (scratch any top tier running back off the list…) with that in mind for the draft, which won’t take place till very late in August. I’m thinking maybe I’ll get Clinton Portis or Marshawn Lynch…maybe even Randy Moss or Tom Brady if I’m feeling especially adventerous (and they havn’t been selected yet) with my first pick, but we’ll have to wait and see. As with the other league, we’ll make sure to post the roster for all to see. Until then, adios!

     

  • Running Back Handcuff Index

    Brandon 9:46 am on 7/22/2008 | 6 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , , , , , , ,

    After participating in a few mock drafts to date, it became apparent that certain backup running backs are held to a higher standard than others. I figured it might be helpful to provide a list of all the starting running backs in the league, along with their primary backup. Also, I wanted to include how important it is to get their backup as a handcuff in your draft, or if you need to draft them at all. Below you can find my “Running back Handcuff Index”, where I’ve grouped running backs into different levels (Very High to Very Low) of importance, in terms of making sure you draft their backup as an insurance policy. Please note that when I say “starter”, I mean the player that is getting drafted earlier and should have the most fantasy impact on the season, not the player who has earned the ceremonial title. So here you go…

    Very High

    Oakland Raiders

    Starter: Darren McFadden
    Handcuff: Justin Fargas
    Concern(s): Rookie / Committee
    Notes: While Fargas might be the starter going into the season (similar to how Chester Taylor was last year), DMC is the guy going early in the draft and should get most of the carries in Oakland before long. However, he IS a rookie and who knows if he’ll live up to his hype. If possible, this is a definite handcuff situation.

    Miami Dolphins

    Starter: Ronnie Brown
    Handcuff: Ricky Williams
    Concern(s): Injury
    Notes: Apparently Ricky Williams has looked great in practice so far and with Brown’s durability questions, this is a “must have” hand-cuff (although if Williams relapses into dope-smoking, you might need a handcuff for your handcuff).

    (More …)

     

  • International Men of Mystery

    Brandon 10:34 pm on 7/15/2008 | 4 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , , , ,

    As I’ve been preparing my power rankings this season, I’ve noticed a few names that I’ve had a lot of difficulty placing amongst the lists. For example, how can you decide between Marvin Harrison and Wes Welker? You know Welker will do well, but do you have a clue how Harrison will do? Neither do I. Players like this I’ve deemed the International Men of Mystery and I figured I’d write an article documenting my random thoughts on a few of them. This is by no means a comprehensive list, as knowing how any player will do in a given season is really a guess anyway. So, without further ado, here are your mystery men…

    Quarterbacks

    Aaron Rodgers (GB): I guess by putting Rodgers on this list, you have to also consider his mentor Brett Favre as a mystery at this point in the year (until he and the Packers figure out what the hell to do with him). Anyways, Rodgers has been riding the pine for years now, racking up a whopping 329 passing yards over the past three seasons. He is now the apparent starter in Green Bay with some big shoes to fill. Considering the weapons that Green Bay has on the offensive side of the ball with Greg Jennings, Donald Driver, James Jones and Ryan Grant, it’s easy to believe that Rodgers could have a great fantasy season (similar to Favre’s 2007 season). However, people might forget that while he was a pupil to one of the all-time greats for these past years, he still has very little experience and there’s a good chance that he’ll go through some growing pains over the course of the season. The good part is that you won’t have to use a high draft pick on him, so you can take him as your second quarterback and only use him on your starters bye week if  necessary. (Risk: Low, Reward: High)

    (More …)

     

  • Into Twitter? So are we.

    Matt 5:05 pm on 7/14/2008 | 5 Permalink Reply

    You can now follow this blog using Twitter. Find us at twitter.com/ffgeekblog and get updated automatically whenever we post. Of course, you could just subscribe to our RSS feed and accomplish the same thing, but far be it from us to tell the Twitterati what to do.

     

  • 2008 Kicker Power Rankings

    Brandon 10:16 pm on 7/10/2008 | 1 Permalink Reply
    Tags: gostkowski, , , Vinatieri

    Power rankings for other positions

    Here are the rankings for kickers going into the 2008 season. To be honest, don’t expect me to update or change this list very much between now and the beginning of the season. I just don’t care that much about kickers, and neither should you. In standard scoring leagues last season, the difference between the top kicker (Mason Crosby) and the fifteenth ranked kicker (Neil Rackers) was only 35 points, which comes out to a little over 2 points a game. I don’t know about you, but there weren’t that many games in my fantasy team’s season that were determined by 2 points or less. (More …)

     

  • Dissent in the ranks

    Matt 7:44 am on 7/10/2008 | 2 Permalink Reply
    Tags:

    My buddy Sean, a fellow RIT alum and lifelong Bills fan, sent me an email taking me to task for daring to be disgusted with Marshawn Lynch. Since I’m kind of a jerk, I’ll post it here, and then eviscerate it publicly.

    I wholeheartedly disagree with you on the Marshawn post from the 21st of June on FFgeekblog.com.  Yes I am trying to kill time until the end of work.

    A.  Police were quoted as saying they believed he didn’t know he hit a lady because there was no attempt to cover up the marks on his whip which clearly indicated he hit something AND it was parked in his driveway.  Not hidden in the garage, not being worked on in a chop shop, just sitting in his driveway.  Marshawn is not the new “crime-scene-OJ.” (More …)

     

  • Brandon Marshall: Just another day in the life

    Brandon 11:01 pm on 7/09/2008 | 1 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , ,

    Of all the guys I have to share my name with, it happens to be one of the most talented, young and upcoming receivers in the NFL…but also one of the stupidest. Consider these events that have transpired over the short career of Brandon Marshall, wide receiver for the Denver Broncos:

    • Present the night that teammate Darrent Williams was shot and killed during a drive by following a night out at a club. According to former teammate, Javon Walker, Marshall was spraying patrons with champagne, which started a confrontation that may have led to the shooting (ironically, Javon Walker was spraying patrons with champagne the night he was mugged in Las Vegas)
    • Forced to go to court due to a domestic disturbance with his girlfriend
    • Rough housing with his brother, he slips and slices his arm open. Luckily the injury should be fully healed by the start of the season
    • Arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence while driving down the wrong direction on a one way street
    • Most recently, he was pulled over and cited with making an illegal lane change and driving without a valid license or proof of insurance

    (More …)

     

  • 2008 Team Defense Power Rankings

    Brandon 9:16 pm on 7/08/2008 | 6 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , , , new england, , san diego,

    Power rankings for other positions

    Here are the rankings for team defenses going into the 2008 season. As you can see, the perennial teams at the top of this list (Chicago and Baltimore) seem to be on a downward spiral, with the new powerhouses of Minnesota and San Diego leading the way this season. With team defenses though, even more so than with tight ends, you definitely don’t want to rush when drafting one. If you don’t get at top tier defense around the 10th round or so, I’d suggest holding off until one of your last picks to take one. The difference between 75% of the defenses is so small that it won’t have much affect on your season…plus if you’re really into weekly match-ups, you could always pick up a defense each week based on the team they’re playing and hope it works out. (More …)

     

  • Four overvalued wide receivers to avoid drafting

    Matt 5:19 pm on 7/08/2008 | 6 Permalink Reply
    Tags: ,

    These four wide receivers stand out to me as representing the “first tier” of overvalued wideouts – guys whose names frequently leap off the page to me as I review power rankings from around the web. Someone in your league will draft one of these players far too early. Don’t let it be you.

    Steve Smith, Panthers

    Why you might draft him: You think Delhomme’s elbow will be fine. You remember Smith’s 2005 season (1563 yards, 12 TD) and, like many fantasy football players, are under the impression that he’s had a few seasons like that one.

    Why you shouldn’t: He hasn’t. Steve Smith is possibly the most overvalued fantasy football player in the NFL. He’s had one elite season, and three good ones. He proved last season that he’s mediocre without Delhomme, whose arm is supposedly improving – but I don’t see too many people lining up to take Delhomme in mock drafts this year. He’s five-foot-nine, dependent on his speed, and 29 years old – so how explosive can he be these days? I’m guessing he’s lost a step, will never have another season like 2005, and will have another immensely disappointing season if Delhomme’s elbow isn’t 100% by week 1.

    Where he’ll go: Pick 22-28.

    Take him if he’s still available at: Pick 35 or later. (More …)

     

  • Mock draft v1.0

    Brandon 3:21 pm on 7/02/2008 | 4 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , , , , , ,

    Over the past week or so, I have been participating in an eight team mock draft over e-mail, hosted by http://www.WestCoastNonsense.com. The teams were made up of people from different fantasy football blogs, including FFLibrarian.com, FantasyFootballBlog.net, TheFantasyFootballReport.com, WestCoastNonsense.com, and PortlandSportsman.blogspot.com. The draft followed the standard serpentine format, with the basic scoring system being 6 points for RB/WR score and 4 points for a QB score. Below you can see the final team that we ended up with:

    QB: Matt Hasselbeck, SEA
    RB: Joseph Addai, IND
    RB: Clinton Portis, WAS
    WR: Larry Fitzgerald, ARI
    WR: Roy Williams, DET
    RB/WR: Reggie Bush, NO
    TE: Antonio Gates, SD
    DEF: Pittsburgh
    Bench: Dwayne Bowe, WR, KC
    Bench: Edgerrin James, RB, ARI
    Bench: Deion Branch, WR, SEA
    Bench: Javon Walker, WR, OAK

    After the jump you can see the round-by-round results, as well as our commentary on the individual picks…
    (More …)

     

  • Revolution Money Exchange is the worst PayPal alternative ever

    Matt 10:17 am on 7/02/2008 | 9 Permalink Reply
    Tags: paypal, revolution money exchange

    If you’ve already joined a Yahoo fantasy football league this preseason, chances are you’ve noticed the big ad for Revolution Money Exchange across the top of the league home screen:

    Screenshot038

    I’m always up for free stuff, so I signed up even though I had no idea what the heck it was. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that what they offer, in theory anyway, is kind of like PayPal but without any fees whatsoever. Normally I’d be kind of sketched out by something like this, which sounded a little too good to be true, but their affiliation with Yahoo made me feel like they were probably pretty legit.

    Well, they aren’t. Stay. The hell. Away. (More …)

     

  • Ask the Geeks: Fred Taylor vs MJD

    Brandon 9:36 am on 7/01/2008 | 6 Permalink Reply
    Tags: , , greg jones, , , mjd

    As we begin to amp up and get ready for the 2008 fantasy football season, I thought it was time to begin our weekly Ask the Geeks column, so we begin with a question from Mark regarding the Jacksonville Jaguars running game this season:

    I had a fantasy football question for you that has me perplexed. I’m a big Jaguars fan, but I’m not sure when to take Freddy T or MJD. Taylor is the starter, but can he remain healthy? How much time will they split? Will Greg Jones be in the mix? Should I avoid them all together? I see MJD in the top 15 on most lists, but I feel like Fred did better last year. I’m thinking Taylor would be an awesome #2-3 RB, but I’m trying really hard to be unbiased. I’d appreciate your thoughts.

    (More …)

     

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