Figuring out the Broncos and other links

As you all can imagine, I was really interested in the outcome of the Bears v Broncos game last night. I wasn't necessarily pulling for a bad game for Cutler but I really wanted the Broncos to shine. There were a few moments when I thought the Broncos D had their act together (hey, it's all relative) but it was a downer of a game for us Broncos fans. Sigh. Keep an eye on Orton's finger.

In other less than awesome news, apparently the updated average ranking position spreadsheet I was working on this weekend has disappeared into a deep, dark hole within my laptop. It's gone, no amount of searching every nook and cranny of the computer has forced it up out of its hiding spot. The silver lining here is that as I gather new rankings today, they will be even more updated than the ones I pulled on Friday. I've got my fingers crossed that I'll have a new version ready by this afternoon and will let you all know when it's ready to go.

But today is a great day since it's closing day on our condo in Boulder - in just a few hours we will be proud sellers. While part of me would like to take a sweet vacation with some of the profits, I think we're really savers at heart who will just rebuild for our next down payment. But here's to real estate transactions today!

Onto today's links...

• First, a few injury updates for you on Matt Cassel, Jerious Norwood, and Jabar Gaffney.
• Wondering whose value has tanked or skyrocketed during this year's preseason games? See what NFL.com has to say in Preseason fantasy risers and fallers.
  
• Sports Grumblings has The Fire Sale: Last-Minute Thoughts up with more thoughts on whose value is going up, down, and who needs to be watched. And throw in a Super Bowl prediction which keeps things even more interesting.
• FFToday's big board of rankings is up - so much to look at here. We've got PPR and non-PPR rankings, point projections, position rankings, and a nice little ease of schedule in the fantasy playoffs graphic. Lots to take in, well done FFToday.
• CBSSports.com looks at RBBCs (running back by committee) in the league and creates a list of top 10 tandems.
• Rotoworld's Getting Separation looks at the latest position battles to see who is stepping it up a bit in the preseason.
  
• And of course, don't miss this week's MMQB with Peter King.

Hopefully I'll be back later today with a new average ranking position spreadsheet...

Get your draft prep here

In an effort to be a bit more hip to the scene in my nabe (that's NY-speak for neighborhood; used anywhere else? Am I just that out of it?), my husband and I took to the streets last night to find some fun sports bars in our neighborhood. Turns out this city loves baseball. In one bar all 7 screens were turned to baseball (including two different views of the CHW v BOS game) and we had to ask for one to show the football game on Fox. In the other bar, the football game was indeed on, but the 14 other screens all showed baseball - or horse racing. I realize it's still the preseason so I won't give up on these places yet but I was surprised. I guarantee sports bars in Boulder would have had way more football going on...am I going to be a football girl in a baseball town?!

So let's get to today's linkage:

• FootballOutsiders led me to the updated news on Roy Williams on PFT - at this time it appears that he did not break his clavicle. But I've got to wonder, does this give Patrick Clayton a bit of a bump as we figure out how Williams is doing?
• Just after linking to an article yesterday that suggested the Bengals are a little more draft worthy this year, I saw an article on Sports Data Hub, Cincinnati Offensive Line Could Collapse Sleeper Season. You all know how I love o-line analysis so this certainly has me thinking...
  
• Hatty Waiver Wire Guru is rushing through his series on offensive analysis - take a look at the summary posts he has up for the AFC North and AFC South.
• The NYT's Fifth Down blog won't be emphasizing fantasy football quite as much this season (so no, you won't be seeing my weekly column up there) but one of the new features they'll have this season is a column from the guy behind Smart Football - may not be as much of a fantasy destination but still worth your time.
• An amusing read from FFToday on auction leagues and why published auction values are useless.
• The way I love the marriage of chocolate and peanut butter, I love a little Rotoworld and Football Outsiders. It's two of the greats coming together as Gregg Rosenthal at Rotoworld interviews Aaron Schatz at FO for his thoughts on the 2009 season - good stuff, really enjoyed it.
• I do love bold recommendations in fantasyland - take a look at No-Offeason.com's 7 Ballsy Predictions for 2009 - some interesting stuff here involving Visanthe Shiancoe, Brandon Marshall, and Justin Forsett.

Today and tomorrow I intend to update my average rankings position spreadsheet and hope to have a new version available by Sunday - I'll get a post up when it's ready and am happy to send the new version out at that time.

Who will fall out of the Top 20 in '09?

As promised, I've got more analysis on the average rankings position spreadsheet front for you all. So I started thinking about the aggregate Top 100 rankings that I've pulled together over the past few years and wondered (as I always seem to do...) how accurate and successful those rankings were. I'll be saving the big "ranking of the rankings" analysis on specific expert sites for the end of the 2009 season of course but I was curious about what happens to that overall average from all the sites I looked at...for example, how many of those players in the top 20 end up performing well enough that season to nab a spot in the following year's top 20 ranking?

I went back through the FFLibrarian archives and found the average rankings for 2007, 2008, and of course 2009. From 2007 rankings there are 9 of the top 20 players that made a repeat performance in the 2008 top 20 rankings. And from the 2008 rankings, 11 of the top 20 are in this year's top 20 rankings. So I'll go ahead and say that from this small sample size, roughly half of the players from the aggregate top 20 overall rankings will fall out of top 20 relevance the following year (and it's fairly equally distributed throughout the top 20, so it's not a case of the top 10 players all sticking around).

From the 2007 rankings, those who showed up in the 2008 top 20 included LaDainian Tomlinson, Brian Westbrook, Steven Jackson, Joseph Addai, Clinton Portis, Larry Johnson, Frank Gore, Peyton Manning, and Willis McGahee.

Those who were in both the 2008 and 2009 rankings include Adrian Peterson, Maurice Jones-Drew, Steven Jackson, Larry Fitzgerald, LaDainian Tomlinson, Frank Gore, Randy Moss, Clinton Portis, Brian Westbrook, Tom Brady, and Reggie Wayne (side note: LT, Westbrook, SJax, Portis, and Gore are the only three to be on top 2o lists all three years).

So which players from this year's top 20 average will remain top 20 quality next year??

Here's a recap on the top 20:

Adrian Peterson Michael Turner Maurice Jones-Drew Matt Forte Steven Jackson DeAngelo Williams LaDainian Tomlinson Chris Johnson Larry Fitzgerald Frank Gore Steve Slaton Drew Brees Andre Johnson Brandon Jacobs Brian Westbrook Clinton Portis Randy Moss Calvin Johnson Tom Brady Marion Barber

I'll be honest, it's hard to imagine many of these guys falling from top 20 status but here are my thoughts...

Most likely to fall out of top 20: Brian Westbrook, Steven Jackson, Clinton Portis, Randy Moss, Brandon Jacobs, Frank Gore, and Marion Barber. Most of these guys have potential injury issues.

Could fall out of the top 20 but I'd be surprised: Andre Johnson, LaDainian Tomlinson, Michael Turner, MJD, DeAngelo Williams, Steve Slaton, and Drew Brees.

Physically possible that these guys could fall out but I'd be stunned: Adrian Peterson, Matt Forte, Tom Brady (not so much because I'm convinced of his top 20 overallness, but the guy didn't even play last year and the experts still have him in the top 20; he'd have to have a leg amputation to fall out of favor with the pros for 2010), Chris Johnson, Larry Fitzgerald, and Calvin Johnson.

So what do you guys think??

Fantasy questions abound

It's a deliciously cool morning here in New York City and I'm truly looking forward to autumn in the city...but first, a little football tonight! I hope you all are loving the constant schedule of football as much as I am. In the meantime I've been all over twitter this morning enjoying the tweets; I had no idea I'd find twitter quite so appealing. I'd chalked it up as being a bit more voyeuristic than I wanted (says the woman who thoroughly enjoys reading her friends facebook status updates while rarely posting her own...) but honestly, twitter as a news feed is tremendous. Why didn't you guys push me in this direction before?!

Onto the links of the day:

• FantasyFootballCalculator takes a look at where Derrick Ward has been drafted this summer - that is, until the dreaded major committee pronouncement from Tampa Bay. See what they say in Were you counting on Derrick Ward this year? to learn where you should be targeting Ward now.
• Find out which Seattle player KFFL is talking about in A fantasy football bust in the making?
• I'm digging Scott Engel's Running Backs Revisited. I think it's really easy to rely on old information or early summer depth charts - remember to keep yourself updated and RotoExperts is a great go-to spot.
• Other updates on the draft front from the Bruno Boys - take a look at their ADP Watch: Rising Quarterbacks and ADP Watch: Rising Running Backs articles.
  
• I had high hopes for Devin Thomas last year (really for the Skins in general) and am sorry to hear his prospects for this year even aren't looking so hot - read FFToolbox's WR Devin Thomas passed on Redskins' depth chart.
• Have Bengals players become far more draft worthy? CBSSports.com takes a look at their team redemption plans in Bengal bounce back in '09? Side note here - has anyone else noticed how many of today's article titles conclude with a question mark? Really that should give you a hint that there's some uncertainty behind each of those articles if you ask me...
• Reasons to love Ray Rice from Rotoworld's Pancake Blocks blog.
• To add yet another reference to Matthew Berry in this fantasysphere, check out his TMR: Just the Facts, which should delight the stats lover in us all.
• I've seen Eddie Royal go before Brandon Marshall in a few drafts now - my husband called this the conservative approach. I just am not sure I could bring myself to do that...do tell readers, why go Royal over Marshall? And yes I'm a Broncos headline fiend so I'm fully aware of all that's going on with Marshall. Still don't get it. Marshall is back at practice by the way.

I'm hoping to be back this afternoon with some more analysis of that Average Rankings Position spreadsheet I pulled together. Stay tuned.

Time to tweet

I caved. I joined twitter. Fear not, I won't be an uber frequent tweeter but feel free to follow along with the occasional FF-related tweets - or just check out the latest tweets on the right side of the blog.

I also wanted to get a link up to my latest Bruno Boys column - Riskiest Picks from the Top 100. I came up with this list based off of the standard deviations I ran on the Average Rankings Position I posted last week. Those players with the highest standard deviation were the ones whom experts had the least amount of consensus on in their rankings. In some ways that makes them not only the risky picks of the Top 100 but also potentially the best values...so take a look!

A post full of rankings

I'm surrounded by a pile of really exciting paperwork right now - seriously, such a thing does exist. It's our settlement documents for our upcoming closing on our condo in Boulder. And I'm psyched. I'm off to seek out a notary here in NYC so that I can zip those documents back to Boulder. Exciting times, my football friends!

Other exciting things are happening - just take a look at the links below for the latest on the football scene:

• The Hazean has created a list of Top 11 Touchdown Vultures for the 2009 - dudes you'll want to keep an eye on as you draft.
  
• Lots of rankings out there - take a look at Fantasy Football Oasis and their positional rankings. This link will take you to their standard re-draft rankings but they also have PPR rankings, dynasty rankings, and IDP rankings...and every possible combination of those types of rankings.
  
• More rankings from the Fantasy Football Cafe - positional rankings only.
• And I know I've linked to these rankings before, but don't forget to check out FFToolbox's updated rankings.
• My final rankings link - Ultimate Fantasy Football Strategy has positional rankings up for both PPR and non-PPR leagues.
  
• If you're into tiers (and who isn't?) take a look at FantasySharks.com's Tiering-Up Quarterbacks.
• Those who are participating in the FFLibrarian monster league with me might be interested in FFToolbox's Deep WRs and Deep RBs for recommendations.
• And since I can't get enough of FFToolbox today - one more link to a quality article from them for those of you in auction leagues - Auction Drafting: Under Priced Players.
• Hatty Waiver Wire Guru has some offensive thoughts up on the AFC East - find out which players are starters, back-ups, sleepers, and "don't bother" types.
• And finally, if you don't know the name Ma'ake Kemoeatu yet, you'll want to read this article from FantasyPros911 to see how the loss of IDP Kemoeatu might mean good things for opposing offenses.
  

I also wanted to note that I am indeed doing my accuracy analysis again this year - or a ranking of the expert rankings. Once again I'm working in conjunction with the FSTA (Fantasy Sports Trade Association) and the winner will be announced at the Winter 2010 FSTA conference. If you're an expert FFer with published rankings and want to participate, check out the details on the FSTA site.

New contest winner + new site!

It's that time of the week, friends. Time to announce the Preseason Week 2 contest winner...last week I asked for guesses at the receiver with the most receiving yards during the preseason week 2 games. And we've got a winner: Larry Dalton (aka RapidBucFan of Conference 2 in the FFLibrarian League). Congrats on targeting the right wide receiver for this week's contest, Larry! Larry suggested that Troy Williamson would bring in 98 yards this past week and while he underestimated Williamson ever so slightly, Williamson was the lead receiver this week with 147 yards. Larry's prize is a season-long subscription to FFXtreme and all its many tools and wiley ways to keep you at the top of your league.

For the preseason week 3 games, I'm looking for guesses at the quarterback with the most passing yards - if you're interested in winning your own FFXtreme subscription, e-mail me with your QB guess and the number of passing yards you think he'll have. I'm only looking at passing yards so don't worry about sending QB rushing yards or TDs.

In the meantime, I have a new site to send your way - and it's pretty awesome. Check out The Lead Pipe Lock and its "omatic fantasy prognosticator" machine. Two of my favorite articles here are the Rough Starts/Best Starts for both WRs and RBs. Of course if you're in the mood for sleepers, look no further than the omatic's 2009 sleepers.

FFLibrarian 1st round results and more!

I knew that pulling off a 96-team league would be tough, that at times it would feel like herding cats, and that all sorts of fun personalities would emerge. Oh so true. The e-mail-style draft started yesterday morning and we're still dealing with a handful of absentee owners - so if you e-mailed me about taking that last open spot a few weeks ago and I let you know the spot was taken, well, you might be hearing from me again.

As for the draft itself, I'm pretty pleased to have snagged Matt Forte in the 1.06 spot and Wes Welker with the 2.11 pick - I'm looking forward to what happens next! Speaking of drafts I'm participating in, follow along with another one I'm doing with the Bruno Boys Expert League Draft Results: Round 1 Recap.

Onto the rest of today's links:

• Now that the 2nd week of the preseason is in the books, see what the Bruno Boys have targeted as The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Preseason QBs (Week 2).
• Ahh, I love Football Outsiders. They keep coming up with more features to bring me back. Take a look at their new player pages - if you're an FO subscriber you can see pretty much all the details you could ever want, but they still open up much of their vault of stats to us non-subscribers, which is great.
  
• Rotoworld's A Preseason Look at Run Defenses is right up my alley. They've taken a stab at ranking the run defenses for 2009, which is helpful when considering not only your D/ST but also in looking at matchups. Good stuff.
• Fifth Down debates who should be the starting QB for the Jets after Sanchez's unfortunate performance last night in And the Winner of the Quarterback Competition Is...
• In other player news, is the Edge going to Seattle? And looks like Shaun Hill will be the 49ers starting QB.
• I'm digging FFToday's Top Ten Dropouts: QBs, RBs, WRs - which players that finished in the top 10 at their position last year will fall out of favor this year?
• I linked to this earlier in the summer but now that drafts are underway, find out how solid of a team you have with FootballGuys.com's Rate my Team feature - it's free!
  

I'll be back later today with an update on the preseason week 2 contest winner here on FFLibrarian...

Triple plays, drafts, and updated spreadsheets

Good morning, fantasy footballers. Well I've bragged about him before and I'll brag about him again now: Eric Bruntlett of the Phillies, my sister's friend's husband (yes, I'm diverging from football for a brief moment except not entirely since I've chatted Eric up about fantasy football). Bruntlett's unassisted triple play yesterday to end the Phillies v Mets game was just the 15th unassisted triple play in league history - I can only imagine how great he felt waking up this morning. Awesome, nice work Eric!

Also, this morning marks the start of the FFLibrarian monster league. Good times, there's already a good level of chaos with mis-drafts and absentee owners. You can follow along with the draft going on in each of the 6 conferences here.

My next update is on the Average Ranking Position spreadsheet that I pulled together last week. I've updated it, not with new sites (not yet!), but with rankings within position - and I also ran the standard deviation for each player's rankings to determine how much of a consensus there is on that player across all the experts. So the lower the standard deviation, the more consensus on the ranking for that player. I then added the standard deviation number to the average ranking position to get a better picture of these rankings - this tells me both a player's ranking and the level of agreement on that ranking, which changes the list I posted earlier ever so slightly. I'll be writing a bit more about this in my weekly column for the Bruno Boys in case you're interested in which players this affects the most. If you'd like a new copy of the spreadsheet, check it out on google docs, scribd, or e-mail me.

Finally, time for links...

• Hatty Waiver Wire Guru attempts to make a team out of late round picks - this is the kind of stuff that could be really valuable for those in deep leagues or who maybe aren't thrilled with the way the first half of their draft went.
• Meanwhile if you've got IDPs on your mind, you might be thinking of the vaunted Steelers defense. So take a look at FantasyPros911 for Fantasy Football's IDP Impact: Steelers Linebackers.
• I'm seeing a fair amount of sleepers/busts articles out there today. First up, CBS Sports has Sleepers, Breakouts, and Busts. I was in a bar watching the Redskins v Steelers game side-by-side with the Giants v Bears game this weekend. It was impressive watching the beastly Clinton Portis next to the beastly Brandon Jacobs. Both are indeed injury risks though, so I am all over the Ahmad Bradshaw train - not just for injury reasons, but because the Giants will inevitably need to rest Jacobs every once in awhile.
  
• The FantasySharks have some NFC West Sleepers and Busts up - Glen Coffee is creeping up my late round grabs list, especially after his great performance this weekend.
• Advanced NFL Stats continues their koko rankings (the simplest projections out there, which are based on last year's performances only) with RBs.
• Ultimate Fantasy Football Strategy has done some research on which running backs are breakout candidates for the 2009 season - they take a look at 2nd year through 5th year players.
• Super sleeper wide receivers from FFToolbox including guys like Marty Booker, Pierre Garcon, and James Jones.
  
• And we'll cap off this Monday post with a link to today's MMQB - No lack of drama as season nears.
  

Camping continues

I survived my meeting with a personal trainer - I was dead on with the presumption that I'd get my butt kicked for my poor posture (and man, are my shoulder blades ever paying for it today!) but at least I was complimented on my squats form. Anyway, one of my goals is to run faster, better, longer - all that good stuff. It's possible that my plan to run like Usain Bolt though might be in peril (the dude keeps breaking his own record!), but I'm trying to get inspired by having the World Track & Field Championships on in the background this morning (I guarantee my husband and brother-in-law are both quite jealous of my morning). Whether or not this will translate into speed at the gym is to be determined...

But back to focusing on football!

• I love this tidbit from FootballOutsiders on Chad Ochocino kicking not only an extra point in last night's game but also a 61-yard opening kick to start the 2nd half.
• Heads up Peyton Manning naysayers - he had a great night last night. 10 of 14 for 167 yards and 2 TDs. In less than a quarter. Pretty awesome.
  
• The Brandon Marshall drama continues. If there's any reason I'm glad to be far from my Broncos these days, avoiding the updates on the Marshall saga on the local news would be it.
  
• For updates on other camp news, take a look at FFToday's Training Camp Hype with a team-by-team update for the week.
• Athlon/Grogan Sports has some words of wisdom for those of us participating in PPR leagues in PPR Strategy: Yes, that extra point matters a lot.
• Top Fantasy Football suggests some guys you might want to target during the middle of your draft if you'd like to bolster up your RBs - Top Mid-Round Fantasy Running Back Steals.
  
• If you missed last night's Live Q&A with the Bruno Boys, don't worry. You can reread the various Qs and get caught up on the latest advice.
• Interesting article from the Fifth Down on Jake Delhomme. I grabbed him as my QB2 in the 14th round, 12th pick recently and felt like I was getting pretty good value there. Agree? Disagree? Speaking of this recent draft, in general, this is not my favorite roster. While I could roll out a bunch of excuses about moving and drafting being a poor combo (I really don't recommend it...), or not liking drafting from the #1 overall spot, I think it was just an overall poor effort on my part. We'll see how it all pans out but I'm less than psyched about my roster.
  

Training for fantasy football season

Later this morning I'm meeting with a personal trainer for the first time in my life. When I joined a gym here in NY last week, along with the membership came the chance to meet with a trainer - who could say no to that? Looking forward to it except I'm sure to get a lesson on my poor posture.

Truly I'm living the life of riley here - working on fantasy football, meeting with trainers, exploring NYC - gotta fit it all in I guess before I find myself a new library gig, right?

Onto today's links...

• Wondering what to do if LaDainian Tomlinson falls to you in this year's draft? I recently did a RapidDraft and grabbed him at the 7th overall spot but if you'd like to hear both sides of the LT argument, take a look at CBSSport.com's How to handle L.T. on Draft Day.
• Tony Holm has his Prognosticator column up on FantasySharks.com with his 2009 Draft Plan - I'm intrigued by his statement that this is the strangest draft year he has ever seen. All the more reason to mock draft before your big day, eh?
• I think Ultimate Fantasy Football Strategy is one of the more impressive sites out there - they're consistently putting up new material that clearly has taken time and effort; good stuff. Take a look at their latest: 14 Proven Draft Recommendations and make sure you go deep into the details.
• Along those same lines, Gregg Rosenthal has 6 Totally Unrelated Draft Tips up on Rotoworld.
  
• I know most of what I focus on here would help out those of you in standard fantasy football leagues, which is probably why I found FanHouse's Flexible Flex Spots? Stack up on QBs so interesting.
• Those of you in IDP leagues who don't already frequent Kilroyz Krystal Ball column on Fantasy Football Oasis are going to want to add him into your weekly/daily site check. You'll get team IDP updates, sleepers, and injury news. Excellent. There just aren't enough IDP sites out there.
• Another site you might want to keep an eye on? LestersLegends.com is cranking out player profiles with impressive frequency - take a look at one of the latest on Gage, Crayton, Hixon, and Bess.
• Looking for more FF rankings? Take a look at the Mac Bros positional rankings - here are the RBs, which are fleshed out in a bunch of detail with pros/cons for the top 15.
  

1st preseason winner

We have a winner. A round of applause for Aaron Burgos who came closest to guessing the running back with the most rushing yards during the Week 1 preseason games - and therefore won a season-long subscription to FantasyFootballXtreme. Aaron went with Glen Coffee and 105 yards and while Coffee came in at 67 yards, Aaron was the only one to wager a guess on Coffee.

For the record, Samkon Gado (STL) came in 1st for the week with 93 yards and Tyrell Sutton (GB) of Northwestern fame (go Cats!) had 91 yards. Seeing as I've watched Sutton play in many, many games since I'm a Northwestern alum, I'm quite pleased to see him topping the preseason charts here. Not that I'm surprised at all. The guy is awesome. I don't want to get carried away with my homer love here but Sutton is possibly worth a late round pick in my book...very late round. But still!

With the 2nd week of preseason starting up pretty soon here, let's get going on the next contest for a FFXtreme subscription. This week the question is: which WR will have the most receiving yards during week 2 preseason games? E-mail me your guesses (both name and number of receiving yards) before the first games start on Thursday night!

Mid-week fantasy fun

I was walking down a beautiful tree-lined street in a nearby Brooklyn neighborhood yesterday afternoon (in search of a new coffee shop; it's now clear to me that nothing gets me exploring like a good cup of coffee) when it happened: I smelled fall. Some of the leaves must have been giving off that wonderful fall-is-here scent and I was reminded yet again that I adore fall. I'm one of those nerds that actually looked forward to going back to school every year, and the scent of late summer grass always makes me think of the fall sports I played. And of course, my football friends, fall means football!

I've heard from so many of you about the average ranking position spreadsheet I posted about yesterday - I'll be adding to it and pulling out positional rankings. Hopefully I'll have the updated sheet up by the end of the weekend. I've put up the first page of the spreadsheet (with the averages) on google docs now in addition to Scribd (or you're still welcome to e-mail me for it).

Let's get to today's links:

• First, I don't think I did a very good job of self-promotion yesterday since I had so much going on with the average rankings spreadsheet but I was on Rapid Draft's Fantasy Lunch radio show yesterday - here's a link to my show with Hegs and The Sports Blonde.
• Also, my first article of the season with the Bruno Boys is up and ready to be read - Standard vs PPR: The Effect on ADP! A bunch of you have indicated interest in PPR leagues so I tried to dig up some details on which players in mid to late rounds are going higher in PPR leagues; who should you be targeting for those rounds?
• Advanced NFL Stats has some interesting things to say about the increased participation of TEs in the NFL passing game since 2001 in Ascent of the Tight End. Perhaps I need to change my TE tune and start drafting top TEs rather than grabbing one in the 7-10 rounds.
• The FFGeekBlog alerted me to the fact that Beanie Wells has reinjured his ankle...is Tim Hightower climbing back up draft boards or am I overreacting?
• In other injury news (and remember to keep your eye on news; I dig Rotoworld's Headlines), Chaz Schilens' sleeper status will have to wait a year or two - he's broken his foot.
• Hatty Waiver Wire Guru has some IDP advice in Top 5 Rookie Defensive Linemen. I need to make some decisions on who I am going to cut in my dynasty league and I can cut one of my 5 IDPs...possibly to be replaced with a rookie? I'm really digging my team though - take a look: QBs: Jay Cutler, Jason Campbell; RBs: Maurice Jones-Drew, Chris Johnson, Felix Jones, Tim Hightower; WRs: Marques Colston, Terrell Owens, Donald Driver, Steve Breaston, Domenik Hixon; TEs: Tony Gonzalez, John Carlson; Kicker: Mason Crosby; IDPs: Yeremiah Bell, Stewart Bradley, Eric Weddle, D.J. Williams, Mario Williams. Who should I drop?? I need to keep 4 IDPs and can't drop my kicker...
• While I couldn't disagree more on the Peyton Manning front (I think he's going to be seriously undervalued this season), I do think Top Fantasy Football's QB or Not QB - A Look at 2009 QB Fantasy Studs and Duds is a good read.

2009 Average Rankings Position

It's time for the 2009 average ranking position spreadsheet! As I mentioned yesterday, I pulled Top 100 overall rankings from 10 fantasy football experts and averaged them together to create one monster average ranking.

There are a few things to keep in mind:

• I tried to ensure that the experts all used the same scoring system (non-PPR by the way) but many sites didn't actually note their system at all.
• I pulled all of these rankings within the span of a few hours so that they represent rankings from the same time period/news/injury updates, etc.
• As in the past several years, I assigned a ranking of 125 to any player that wasn't ranked by a site. For example, several sites did not rank Donnie Avery within their Top 100 players, so I gave Avery a ranking of 125 from those sites to try and represent that missing rank.

The top 30 overall players are as follows:

Adrian Peterson	1.10
Michael Turner	2.90
Maurice Jones-Drew	3.20
Matt Forte	3.90
Steven Jackson	6.00
DeAngelo Williams	6.50
LaDainian Tomlinson	8.60
Chris Johnson	8.90
Larry Fitzgerald	9.50
Frank Gore	10.30
Steve Slaton	12.30
Drew Brees	13.80
Andre Johnson	14.10
Brandon Jacobs	14.90
Brian Westbrook	14.90
Clinton Portis	15.30
Randy Moss	16.10
Calvin Johnson	17.70
Tom Brady	19.50
Marion Barber	20.30
Peyton Manning	21.00
Reggie Wayne	22.30
Greg Jennings	23.70
Steve Smith	24.90
Roddy White	26.90
Anquan Boldin	28.20
Ronnie Brown	29.80
Ryan Grant	32.20
Marques Colston	32.30
Aaron Rodgers	32.70

I've posted the full spreadsheet up on Scribd but if you'd like an excel version of the spreadsheet, just e-mail me and I'll send it your way. I have the averages in one worksheet but each expert's top 100 is listed as a separate worksheet as well.

The expert sites I looked at are: Ask the Commish, CBS Sports, ESPN, FFToolbox, FOX Sports, KFFL, NFL.com, SI, SportingNews.com, and Yahoo. I originally was going to include No-Offseason as well but their inclusion of IDPs (individual defensive players) encouraged me to drop them out since it seemed like a different style of ranking. I did however include their top 100 in the full spreadsheet in case you'd like to take a look.

Keep in mind that this is just one tool to help you with your draft but I do hope it will be useful! I'm happy to update these rankings so if you've got a favorite site that has a Top 100 ranking that I haven't included, please let me know.

Prelude to the average rankings

I'm amazed at how quickly the day passes when I'm not at work - I had this impression that without a job I'd be lolling around, bored and without a purpose, but turns out that beyond the whole "get to know the amazing city of New York" thing, I can actually find quite a few things to occupy my time. We'll see how long this lasts...especially as I sit in an un-airconditioned 85.1 degree apartment. We thought we could just wait out the rest of the summer without putting in a window unit but WOW it is hot and humid here.

Onto today's links...

• We've got players returning to practice - Brandon Marshall and Chris Wells - which always makes fantasy owners happy.
• A search for WR fantasy sleepers from Rotoworld - I can't help but believe that when Rotoworld calls you a sleeper, you immediately become the player that everyone thinks they have the inside scope on, but in reality has just become a bit overblown and is suddenly drafted about a round too early. Really it's a compliment to Rotoworld's popularity and is something to keep in mind when any big site lists their favorite sleepers.
• I almost hate to link to Michael Vick stuff just since I think it has been WAY too much of a headline (like the Favre back and forth that continues...) but I missed the 60 Minutes with Vick last night. I caught up on it with the Fifth Down's Did You Believe Vick on '60 Minutes'?
• Football Jabber has updated positional rankings - take a look!
• More rankings from Fighting Chance Fantasy - QBs, RBs, and TEs so far.
  
• Hatty Waiver Wire Guru has posted his first video in quite some time. He's got some thoughts up about guys to keep an eye on during the preseason.

I mentioned last week that I was working on my annual average rankings spreadsheet and it is less than 24 hours away, I think. I've gathered Top 100 rankings from 11 big sites that offer up their rankings for free (ESPN, SportingNews, CBS Sports, No-Offseason, SI, Yahoo!, KFFL, Fox Sports, Ask the Commish, NFL.com, and FFToolbox) and am pulling together an average ranking across all those sites...so stay tuned!

2009 auction update and other links

I'm a little embarrassed to admit this but I'm in heaven right now - we finally have wireless (and cable) and my life has just taken a serious turn for the better. At the risk of sounding like a future shut-in in the making, I couldn't be happier to be able to sit on my couch and write this post. Sure, I miss out on some of the crazies at the local coffee shop but I think I'm about to be so much more productive.

So on that note, let's dive right in to today's headlines!

• FFToday takes a pretty solid stab at some Below the Radar - Sleepers. I feel like each of us might have our own take on what "sleeper" really means but this article does a pretty good job of locating later round players that could be real gems.
  
• Looking for team defense rankings? See what the Bruno Boys have to say in 2009 Fantasy Football Defensive Rankings.
• For those of you who are in the mood to take a quiz and test your FF knowledge, try Athlon/Grogan's 2009 Fantasy Quiz to see how ready you are to draft. I'll be honest, it was tough.
  
• I know a bunch of you are big proponents of auction leagues - I have yet to participate in one but I'll try to get some auction details out your way, like FFToolbox's latest update to their 2009 Fantasy Football Auction Values.
• I just grabbed Donovan McNabb with the 5.02 pick in a league with no qualms about the addition of Michael Vick. My latest roster update for that league is: 1.02 MJD, 2.11 Marques Colston, 3.02 Anquan Boldin, 4.11 Joseph Addai, 5.02 Donovan McNabb.
• The cat is out of the bag (I can't help but envision Kramer when I say that...) with Chaz Schilens - he had a pretty solid first preseason game, which of course is not to say that he'll be a fantasy goldmine but he's definitely someone worth thinking about in late rounds.
• I shied away from grabbing Steve Smith in the recent draft I mentioned above but it seems like I might have been a little too conservative. Smith is back in full pads and seems to be back on track.
  

Finally, I have an opening in my monster 96-team Fantasy Football Librarian league. Would anyone be interested in taking that spot? You'd have to be up for an e-mail style draft starting on August 24th - check out some of the league details here. The first person to e-mail me has the spot, so get your request in! Update: the spot has been taken but thank you all for your interest!

Preseason Contest!

Today is a wonderful day: one of my dearest friends is at the hospital, gearing up to give birth to an amazing baby boy or girl and I, for one, am thrilled. Welcome to the world little one, can't wait to meet you.

Another reason to love today? It's the start of the 2009 preseason - hurrah for football! And with the start of football is a FFLibrarian/FantasyFootballXtreme contest. Those who came by the site last year will remember that I gave away free season-long subscriptions to FFXtreme in some weekly preseason contests - and we're doing it again this year! So if you'd like to win a subscription to FFXtreme, e-mail me the name and rushing yards for the RB that you think will have the most rushing yards in this week's preseason games. It's a way to keep the preseason games a little more interesting - and thank you all for being loyal readers!

• As seems par for the course this time of year, let's hit up the big injury and roster news for the day. First up, just something to keep an eye on for now: Braylon Edwards caught his foot on the turf and left practice early yesterday. May not be a big deal but stay tuned on that front.
• More injury news to just be aware of for now - Dallas Clark will miss the preseason game with a slight concussion. Also note the Colts o-line changes/injuries in this article.
• Next, Denver waived Ryan Torain making the backfield slightly less crowded. I of course pay a great deal of attention to Broncos news and so far I'm kind of entertained by the fact that Peyton Hillis seems to have a quote for every Denver story. He's a well-spoken dude so it works for him, but I do sort of enjoy waiting for my Hillis commentary now on each Denver piece of news. In other Denver news, a ruling on Brandon Marshall's battery charges are expected tomorrow...
• As always, Advanced NFL Stats puts together an interesting article in Comparing Running Performance and how to rate how well a player runs. What I find particularly interesting here is a nugget towards the end about Adrian Peterson, and that it's really just 2.2% of his runs that push him beyond average and into the exceptional runer realm.
• The Hazean has a mock draft database - not sure I noticed this feature before but it's something interesting to scope out. I'm participating in two real drafts right now (both over e-mail) - one that I mentioned yesterday has only gone through Round 3; the other is in Round 13 now and I'll post my team and thoughts on my best and worst picks sometime soon.
• In case you haven't taken a look at FFXtreme before and are wondering what they're all about, you might want to take a look at a new feature they have up - their Player Pages. I really like the ease of seeing historical player stats and fantasy analysis in one shot. Added bonus if you're a subscriber? You can get projections for each player.
• I'll be the first to admit that I don't really know very much about Philip Rivers. Perhaps it's that whole Broncos/Chargers thing but I've somehow avoided becoming a Rivers expert. Sports Data Hub is here to clear things up for me in Ten Facts You Need to Know About Philip Rivers.
• The Bruno Boys are figuring out which kickers are likely to bust (yes, kickers) so read up...though I must say I'm a bit more of a Prater believer - he'll have a year of experience under his belt and the iffy offense is almost perfect for an increase in field goals if you ask me.
• KFFL.com is one of my favorites - take a look at part of their debate series on Chris Johnson vs Steve Slaton with pros, cons, and a final verdict on the superior fantasy player.

By the way, I've been at a Starbucks all morning writing this post up (can't wait for my in-home Internet to be set up tomorrow morning!) and there was a man in here who definitely used the line, "You'd look great in that all black outfit in my black Mercedes down the street" to a woman at the table next to him. He even got up to point out the car. Spectacular.

Manifestos and bold predictions

Progress...I'm finally feeling a little bit more settled in New York. Funny how a bed, couch and real utensils can make a significant difference. I'm still anxiously awaiting the arrival of the Internet in our apartment since I'm basically a Starbucks lurker now - not my favorite way to spend a morning, though certainly could be far worse.

I've heard from several of you about the annual average rankings that I pull together each August - don't worry, it's en route! That whole moving and lack of Internet thing has put a real cramp in my style but I'll be going out to a bunch of the best expert sites out there and pulling together their rankings to create one central average ranking. I should have that up about a week from now but if you're super eager for that info, take a look at the FFNerd who does something very similar.

Something else to keep an eye on - I'll be doing another column for the Bruno Boys this season and I'm hoping to have my first one up in the next few days. I'll be sure to link over to it once its live.

Now onto the good stuff...

• ESPN's Matthew Berry's annual Draft Day Manifesto is up and it's lengthy. Read it, digest it, and keep a lot of that advice in mind come draft day. I really like the way he narrows down the stats from last year to show that the number of elite WRs is really quite small. I'm in an expert league led by the Bruno Boys that is drafting right now. From the #2 overall spot so far I've grabbed MJD (reader Matt will be less than thrilled with that move) at 1.02, Marques Colston at 2.11 and Anquan Boldin at 3.02. I'm pleased with my double awesome WRs...
• The Hazean offers up four rookies that might just be able to come in off the bench and make an impact this season. I'm digging LeSean McCoy in particular; I just have a bad feeling about Westbrook this season (but I really like Westy still...).
• Drumroll for some bold predictions please...first up, FFToolbox queried each of its writers for their boldest predictions on the season. Read on for thoughts on AP, Michael Vick, and Donald Brown among others.
• The next bold prediction comes from Rotoworld. Yesterday they suggested that Davone Bess would be the league's leader in receptions. Today their bold prediction is that Matt Schaub will be the #1 fantasy QB. I eat this stuff up. And I continue to dig Owen Daniels and yet he's gone 1-5 picks before me in each league I've participated in so far...I guess I don't have a firm grasp on his value quite yet.
• In case you were wondering how big a league could be (we're talking a league with just one draft, unlike the FFLibrarian League which has 96 teams but multiple different conferences and drafts), CBS Sports has a 30-teamer, no bench. Interesting stuff.
• If you're looking for some guys to grab in later rounds, take a look at Hatty Waiver Wire Guru's advice in Late Round Picks.

Injuries abound

This might be a quick post since our furniture is set to be delivered in roughly one hour so my Internet time at the local Starbucks is a bit tight. I'll do what I can to get some of the best links up!

Sadly I feel like there's a ton of injury news to update you on...

• Steve Smith injured his shoulder yesterday - looks like he'll miss a minimum of two weeks; hopefully this won't be a big deal but perhaps Muhammad and Jarrett should be on our radar a bit more now.
• Antonio Bryant will have his knee scoped and will likely miss 3-4 weeks. Seems to me like this bumps up Winslow's value early in the season as Bryant gets back in the swing of things - and suggests more of an emphasis on the running game perhaps?
• Felix Jones's toe injury might be flaring up - he was held out of practice for at least part of the day yesterday.
• Moving on from injuries, FFToolbox alerts us to the fact that Dwayne Bowe is practicing with the second and third stringers...hmm, not what I like to see out of my WR1!
• More surprises from my Broncos - Marshall is not on the starting lineup. Oh Denver, I sure hope you know what you're doing.
• Want a quick and dirty list of sleepers without really any details or analysis? Hey, sometimes something speedy is all you want - if so, then look no further than DR U Fantasy Football Guru.
• Davone Bess is now ahead of Greg Camarillo on the Dolphins' depth chart and Rotoworld has a nice blurb on why you might want to consider Bess in a PPR league - and get this, why he might lead the league in receptions this season. Love the boldness.
• Hatty Waiver Wire Guru has a list of things to remember come draft day. Not sure I agree with the idea of not drafting a kicker at all, I'd just wait until the very end to do so...but to each their own.

I'll be back tomorrow with more. Wish me luck with the movers on a hot and muggy NYC day!

Back in the fantasy swing of things

At long last I have arrived in NYC and have so many things I could say right now about the process of moving out here; some good, some bad. We're still not fully moved in yet - our furniture is all being delivered tomorrow so we've been going with the air mattress and eating out a lot route so far. Frankly I can't wait to have something other than the floor to sit on...

Another quirk in our moving process is that we won't have Internet access in our apartment until this weekend (beyond our iPhones, which singlehandedly made our move 10x better by the way). Serious bummer for someone like me who relies on being able to wake up and get on her computer stat. But like the good librarian that I am, I'm kicking it at my local Brooklyn Public Library, enjoying the free wifi.

So I have to admit I missed the big Hall of Fame game last night (New Yorkers might give me a pass - I was at the famous Grimaldi's Pizzeria with friends) but I've been catching up on the game news all morning. Read on for the latest links...

• Word on the street from CBS Sports is that T.O. looked as explosive as ever in the one series that he played in the HOF game, but Kerry Collins was the big star for the night.
• Some of the first big injury news on the fantasy front is out: Donnie Avery will miss 4-6 weeks with a severe sprain to his foot. My Laurent Robinson antenna just perked up.
• I just checked out FFSheets.com for the first time - pretty cool. If you're looking for a way to create our own custom rankings, take a look at what these guys have pulled together. You can also drag and drop players into the order you like and print a clean, customized ranking. I'd be even more excited about this if there were additional RBs and WRs listed, and I'd also like some background on how they created their default rankings. Even the most proactive of us can be found relying upon a standard ranking so it would be helpful to know a bit about the scoring system used here in this default ranking.
• If you're thinking Vegas these days, take a look at Lester's Legends contest with VisitLasVegas.com - you could win a $100 Southwest Airlines gift card (and technically you don't even have to use that gift card to fly to Vegas if you had another destination in mind...).
• Gregg Rosenthal brings us the latest draft trends for the 2009 season. I've done a few drafts so far and think Gregg is right on with his ten trends. I highly recommend you take a little time to do a mock draft before you draft this season - might seem like a lot of prep time but let's be honest, you're here on this site, you probably don't shy away from a high quantity of FF prep time.
• Peter King's MMQB is full of preseason and HOF game thoughts - good stuff as always. Last week I put up a guest post from a Giants fan on which Giants players to keep an eye on - he was relatively high on Mario Manningham, which jives with what I'm reading here from King.
• Reasons to dig Ronnie Brown now that he's two years out from his leg injury from FootballDocs.com.
• Knowshon Moreno is signed and ready to impress in Denver - Moreno is expected to play in the preseason opener this Friday and I for one can't wait to see how he looks.
• Finally, Scott Engel from RotoExperts is teaching fantasy football courses this season. I'm highly amused by this but if you're out there either as a beginner or an old pro and are wondering who to draft, how to draft, or what exactly I'm talking about all the time on this blog...then it might be worth your time to check out Engel's classes.

Now I'm off to explore my new neighborhood! I'm in the market for some good sports bars so any suggestions in Manhattan or Brooklyn are welcome...

Guest post on Giants!

Welcome to the first ever guest post on FFLibrarian. I've been mulling over how to fill some of the void here this week since I've been trapped in a car all day long, moving to NYC and the perfect opportunity fell into my lap: the UltimateNYG offered to share his thoughts on the Giants players' fantasy value. Now here's the catch...he's not a fantasy football guy at all. He just knows a TON about the Giants. I think that almost makes him more valuable since he understands the gist of fantasy football and can share what he knows about the Giants as an avid fan, and turn that into helpful FF advice. So needless to say there are some things that I don't entirely agree with him on, but I think it's great to get his ideas out there. Do you all agree or disagree with his calls?

Without further ado...

Ultimatenyg knows very little about Fantasy Football but enough about the Giants to discuss 1/32nd of the FF drafting stock. Let's go through each position on a FF value basis:

Quarterback:
Eli Manning - NO. Stay away. Eli gets better each year, but he is not the kind of QB you can expect to take over a game. And since he still plays in the Meadowlands Wind Tunnel and has not made any offseason attempts to change his grip for the tight spiral, let him drop. Check his stats in late Nov/December. Nasty with a capital N.

Running Back:
Brandon Jacobs - NO. He just signed a big contract, he slows down, he gets hurt every year, his only redeeming fantasy value is that he is a short yardage pounder for TDs. Let him fall for value.

Ahmad Bradshaw - YES. On a value basis he could explode. Assuming he stays healthy and protects the ball (he did not do either very well last year), he is a secret weapon that is #2 on the depth chart behind Brandon Jacobs. That means platoon relief and plenty of touches. The Gilbride factor (see Kevin Boss below) should not be a problem. He'll be in his 3rd year, he knows the offense, he has TD ability every time he touches the ball. We're sticking our necks out here and saying he is going to be awfully good for the Giants this season. Get him.

Danny Ware - Maybe. When all of the RBs are gone, you take him because either Bradshaw or Jacobs will get hurt and then you'll have a lot of touches.

Andre Brown - NO. But get this guy in 2011. Remember where you read about him first.

Wide Receiver:
Steve Smith - NO
Domenik Hixon - NO
Sinorice Moss - NO
Mario Manningham - Maybe. He's worth a gamble at the very end of the draft because he could be a sleeper lottery ticket that gets cashed if he has his s*** together.
Hakeem Nicks - NO
Ramses Barden - NO. 2011 Red zone monster?

Tight End
Kevin Boss - YES. The only enemy of taking this guy is named Kevin Gilbride, the Offensive Coordinator of the NY Giants. One of these days Gilbride is going to wake up and realize that he has a 1000 yard receiving option who is not a WR. One of these days Gilbride is going to wake up and realize that he has TD red zone money and his name is Kevin Boss. He's big, fast enough and has great hands. All he needs is his number to be called. He has a high TD/reception ratio because he did not get get thrown the ball enough AND still managed to get 5 TDs when Gilbride was awake. This pick has less to do with Boss and everything to do with the OC. If he's in the game plan, you will score big with this player.

Travis Beckum - Maybe. Worth a gamble at the very end of the draft. He's a rookie who could get meaningful touches. No training camp upticks yet.

Summary - Boss and Bradshaw are off the national radar because the OC needs a lobotomy. With Ward gone to TB, this is now Bradshaw's chance. And if the OC gets Tight End religion Boss is tremendous value.

Rankings recap

Well we're in Ohio visiting with family for a few days before rolling
on in to NYC. My Internet access is not good so this will be brief but
I've got the first ever guest post that will go up later this
afternoon, so stay tuned.

But in the meantime I thought I'd link back to the analysis I did this
past year that looked at expert preseason rankings and determined
which expert was the most accurate. See the results at: http://www.fflibrarian.com/2009/02/accuracy-analysis-for-2008.html

I'll be back with my normal links next week!

FF Omaha Style

Greetings from Omaha. As I've probably made abundantly clear, I'm en route from Colorado to NYC this week - and thank you all for your well wishes with the move. Today we have a very manageable trip from Omaha to Chicago where we'll stay with my college roommate. Should be a fun time. Fortunately that means I've got a little time for a post...

• Is Eli Manning about to become the highest-paid player in the NFL? See what the Fifth Down has to say about the deal that's in the works that will send $35 million guaranteed to Eli.
• RapidDraft's Schedule helps Hasselbeck, hurts Orton and Cassel takes a look at strength-of-schedule rankings for pass offenses. As Schauf notes, this obviously isn't going to dictate who you draft but is another bit of info to keep in mind as you draft.
  
• Looking for some breakout candidates? Look no further than FantasySharks.com's suggestions in Give me a breakout candidate.
• On the flip side, Ultimate Fantasy Football Strategy brings us their Top 10 Overvalued Players.
  
• Hatty Waiver Wire Guru recommends some Young stud RBs and Reliable WRs you might want to target on draft day.
  
• You can always count on FootballOutsiders.com to come up with some new sort of metric - today we have the Receiver plus/minus which gives us the top ten and bottom ten receivers based on their catch rate. Check it out - interesting stuff. The "what does this mean though?" analysis will come next...
• More from FootballOutsiders - a continuation of their Wisdom of the Crowds series, this time with projections for TEs.
• I was recently tempted with the idea of taking Bernard Berrian in an e-mail draft but I just didn't feel confident enough in his ability to produce. After reading Rotoworld's Vikings offense = fantasy gold? I wondered what the rest of the fantasy world thinks. I took Kevin Walter at the 7.01 spot in a PPR league that starts 3 WRs; should I have gone with Berrian instead? The rest of my team so far is: MJD at 1.01, Clinton Portis at 2.12, Dwayne Bowe at 3.01, Aaron Rodgers at 4.12, Santonio Holmes at 5.01, Donald Brown at 6.12, Kevin Walter at 7.01. For details on the rest of the draft, take a look here.
  
• Speaking of Donald Brown, he's on FFToolbox's list of 2009 Fantasy Football Sleepers RBs.
  

Okay, now we're back on the road again...

Moving day is here!

Dare I curse myself? I'd like to report there might be a real estate miracle happening in Boulder right now. At our condo to be exact. The condo has been on the market for a few months and really wasn't selling (despite its awesomeness) until perhaps now. It's basically the 11th hour...and we think we have found a buyer. This is something you should all be cheering for since well not only would I really appreciate it, but it would delay my job search desperation (in a move to avoid poverty in NYC of course) and would ultimately mean more time spent on the blog.

Anyway, I'm sitting in our living room waiting for the movers to arrive so here are a handful of quick links...

• A few quick injury notes - looks like Brandon Marshall injured his hamstring during Sunday's camp and Beanie Wells sprained his right ankle. I guarantee there will be more to come on both of those fronts so stay tuned.
• In fact, speaking of staying hip to news from training camp, remember to scope out some of my favorite news sources: Rotoworld, KFFL, or NFL.com's training camp blog.
  
• PPR league folks, heads up from the Chicago Tribune that Matt Forte isn't expected to have as many receptions this season...
• The SportingNews.com draft kit is available for download (for free) and I'm about to settle in for a morning of movers and reviewing the draft kit. What could be better?
• Finally, MMQB's First week of training camp visits fun, exhausting and revealing. Seriously, I just love all the insider camp scoop.

I'm actually thinking I might be able to post a little more this week than I thought, but this Friday keep an eye open for a guest blogger on the site...