It's 2016! Time for a new general fantasy football thread.

I'm already being offered a trade.

I give Shady McCoy and Devin Funchess get Mark Ingram and Marvin Jones. This guy has been all over me to get McCoy, started out offering Ingram straight up for McCoy and kept going. This looks to be in my favor but I'm wondering what I don't know? Is there a reason he's hell bent on trading Ingram for McCoy?

 

I would take that trade. It's possible that he's high on Shady because he plays in a run-heavy offense, but he also is coming off an injury and has a lot of use for a RB his age. I'm also not a fan of Funchess and Marvin Jones is set to have a career year.

 

That was my inclination but I wondered if I was missing something since both players he's trying to trade are "rated" higher than what he would be getting. I wasn't sure if I was missing an injury or something.

 

I thought I had my lineup set being just a few days out of drafting. But I just added Ware to my roster, and see that he is looking to be the featured back for KC. So now am wondering if I should start him. I could either have him as my RB2 over L Murray, or my Flex over Maclin. Do you think the Chiefs will open up with a strong running or passing game against SD?

Here is my lineup for reference:

QB: R Wilson
WR: A Brown, A Jeffrey
RB: Ingram, L Murray
TE: Fleener
Flex: Maclin? Ware?
D/ST: Chiefs
K: Catanzaro

Bench:Tyrod Taylor, D Woodhead, Ivory, S Shepard, C Chandler, Maclin/Ware

 

Start Ware, sit Maclin. Alex Smith didn't miraculously learn how to throw TD's to his WR's in the offseason. Kansas City plays through their RB's and Ware looks to be the week one starter, or at least the week one bulk of the carriers. He also can play on 3rd down so you should get some decent points off PPR.

 

I am drafting 6th tonight in my league. 3 people ahead of me have (for now) locked in their keepers (we get 1) from last year: A Brown, OBJ, and J Jones. Of the remaining two guys ahead of me, one of them is a big Falcons fan and the other is a "never take a QB in the first 2 rounds guy," so I suspect that Devonta Freeman will get picked by one of them. We are NOT a PPR league, standard head-to-head on ESPN.

Adrian Peterson is another guy's keeper later down. So, I will have the option to pick the best RB/WR left at that point or the top QB. Any suggestions as to who that top RB/WR should be? And, if Cam Newton puts up the kind of numbers he did last year, can someone explain why I shouldn't take him? For all the other QBs, I would wait, but Cam's numbers are big enough to be a difference maker, aren't they?

 

With those keepers off the board in a standard league, you're looking at either Hopkins or Gurley. Gurley is projected as the top RB for the year, and Hopkins is probably just barely below the big 3 WRs. Since its standard scoring, coin flip it.

Cam that early would be a waste. I'm also a guy that thinks qbs shouldn't go that early. Top tier qbs are nice to have, but if it means you are stuck without a stud wr or rb, it's a waste. You can get drew brees, who consistently puts up close to 5000 yards a season, in probably the 6th round. If you take Cam in the 1st, you're not going to find similar value at wr or rb that late.

 

Hopkins is where I was leaning, so thanks.

What I was thinking, was that's true with every QB, except Cam. Last year, he put up an average of 23.5 pts and A Brown averaged 15.5 pts. So, with that 8 pt difference, if I took Cam, wouldn't I "just" need an RB or WR that average 9 pts or so? For the past 6 years, our league has been won by whomever had the top 1 or 2 QB, (including me) and not by the guy with the top RB or WR.

 

I don't really follow that logic. What you need to be comparing is the difference in scoring between Newton and a lower-tier QB versus the difference in scoring between your top RB/WR option and the RBs/WRs in the round you could get one of those QBs.

 

No, you're right. I was only considering it for Newton. But, the difference is so small, that it's not worth it. Also, I have no idea what I'm doing, because every time I think I have a strategy, dumb luck, bad matchup or injury prevails anyway.

6 QB Newton 23.5
16 RB Johnson 10.5
25 WR Watkins 9.9
36 RB Hill 9.1
45 WR Cooper 8.6
56 FL Bernard 7.4
65 TE Kelce 6.9
Total = 75.9


6 WR Hopkins 13.3
16 RB Johnson 10.5
25 WR Watkins 9.9
36 RB Hill 9.1
45 FL Cooper 8.6
56 QB Fitzpatrick 17.1
65 TE Kelce 6.9
Total = 75.4

 

I'd take Lamar Miller over Gurley or Nuk. There's also Eddie Lacy, AJ Green, Brandon Marshall. Not sure what the rest of the keepers look like, but I would rather take Miller and get a decent but not top tier WR over a top tier WR and having to take Matt Forte or something like that. You can easily grab Watkins, Landry, Cooper, Evans, Cobb, Decker, etc the round after you are picking.

Don't ever take a QB before the 6th or 7th round. There is very little week to week difference between the top 4 guy and the top 12 guy. Look at last years totals. Outside of Cam Newton and his freak scoring year, the #4 QB and the #12 QB were separated by ~45 points. Over the course of a full season, that works out to be 3.75 points a game. You can wait until round 12 and get roughly the same value as the person taking a QB in round 5. Try and do that with a RB and unless you get ridiculously lucky, you'll never find a RB in round 12 with the same value as a RB in round 5.

 

Does your league just let you keep 1 player generally, or does it to the thing where you lose the round you took that player in?

I've never really understood the virtue of the former approach. It feels like it tends to have the effect of just making the first round a different league's second round rather than valuing strategic thinking.

 

Anyone here do FanDuel or Draft Kings?

 

ESPN's let's you keep how ever many the commissioner sets. This was our first year trying it, and so we decided on 1 keeper. No matter what player you choose or when your pick is - we do a standard snake draft starting in reverse order of last year's final standings - your keeper becomes your first round pick. We could do a manual draft, and make it like you're suggesting or some other variation, but drafting online is the easiest.

Now, what none of us knew, because we had never done it before, was that then the snake does not start until round 3, essentially. So, whoever has first pick also has the 11th pick. (We've been a 12 team league forever, and two guys dropped out this year, which also changes the dynamic a bit.) When that popped up and we realized it wasn't snaking, we immediately paused the draft. We took a vote, reset the draft, eliminated keepers, and started the draft over. ESPN says that the reason for that is so that no one will try and improve their draft position by NOT selecting a keeper. I don't agree with that logic.

Anyway, so we did a standard draft, and this was our first round:
1 Antonio Brown, Pit WR
2 Todd Gurley, LA RB
3 Adrian Peterson, Min RB
4 Julio Jones, Atl WR
5 Ezekiel Elliott, Dal RB
6 Odell Beckham Jr., NYG WR
7 David Johnson, Ari RB
8 Devonta Freeman, Atl RB
9 A.J. Green, Cin WR
10 DeAndre Hopkins, Hou WR

I took Beckham at 6.

 

I do. I usually start the season with $200 deposit and ride it out to the end of the year. I cash out back to $200 every few weeks.

I primarily stick to the 50/50's and heads up matchups as those are easily exploitable if you know how to pick players with solid floors.
I'll be playing about 20 entries in the milly maker on Sunday and then during the year I usually do a few entries a week into the $3 and $5 big tourneys.

I've consistently made money every year I've been playing, although it's usually only $100-300 for the full season.

 

I do DFS.

If you want advice, PM me and I'll share my lineups. That way you know who not to pick.

Football is a little bit easier for a new person than baseball (which I found impossible) or basketball (which took me a lot of research to get to the point where I can roughly break even). Cheap players in expanded roles due to injury are usually good bets (like Ware), along with some established studs in good matchups.

I'd also keep an eye out for players with big discrepancies between the two sites, because either they are overpriced in one, underpriced in the other or both.

 

Good day for ESPN's site to go down, lol.

 

Currently sitting in some very favorable positions in DFS gonig into the last game of the night. Could be a huge score for me this weekend. I don't even need the game tonight to be low scoring, but if it is, I wouldn't be upset.

 

WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! Nice $2.2k score today. Great start to the DFS season.
Here was my lineup.

QB Drew Brees
RB Latavius Murray
RB Isaiah Crowell
WR Michael Crabtree
WR A.J. Green
WR Brandin Cooks
TE Dwayne Allen
FLEX Spencer Ware
DST Bills