On Thursday, September 2, 2010, RotoCommunity.com participated in a fantasy football league with the other industry experts, called the Fantasy Football Search Expert League. 

MY TEAM

ANALYSIS

The Fantasy Football Search lineup included some really great participants. FFS was represented by Jason Swist and the excellent and pugnacious Todd Farino. The full cast was too long too mention here. The format was a modified PPR format that was extremely generous to receivers with a point a catch and a point for every 15 yards, vs. a point for each 10 for runners. It also used a standard 3 WR/2 RB set, but the utility slot was WR/TE so the race was on for Wide Receivers. Also notable was the -3 for interceptions, which pretty much killed Brett Favre's value... not that this writer is a Packer fan with a grudge. The format also provides huge rewards for kickers who do not miss. 3 points for 0-19, 4 for 20-29 and up to 8 (!) for a 50 yarder. Big penalty for misses, but that ups the kicker value.

One of the many nice things about the Yahoo interface is that it is easy to see how this years players scored last year under the league system. Click "players" and sort by fantasy points. (after the draft, just swap it to "all players" instead of "all available"). Even if you are playing non-Yahoo leagues, I encourage you to set up a dummy Yahoo! league to see how variations of scoring work. It is a much easier system for this purpose than any other. In this case it was obvious that Quarterbacks scored really well... all of them. Jay Cutler scored better than Andre Johnson. So there was no real advantage in drafting a QB. And players with receptions scored well. 

Our general feeling, given the set up 4 WR slots and 1 TE, with the point per catch, was to load the receivers and let the QB happen later.

Round One

The NFL Fantasy XTra squad saw right off that quarterbacks scored extremely well here and picked Drew Brees in the #5 position. They were consistent in that approach, taking only Arian Foster as the only RB in the first five rounds. Jason Swist also elected to go receiving with the pick of Miles Austin at #10 overall. We'd guess that Austin would have been available at his next pick (#15). 

Our Pick: Andre Johnson. The risk is that he will regress after such a good season. We don't think it will happen and that the Texans have enough weapons to avoid an all-out strategy against the big guy. Having Frank Gore available at that pick was a wrencher, but we held to our guns.

Round Two 

Swist reached a bit again for Jamaal Charles. Charles is one of our favorite players and Swist's next pick was 34. So we see it. More than that, we endorse the idea of getting your players early if you have confidence in them. We're a big fan of going a round early if you have looked seriously at the numbers. The object isn't to get bargains, the object is to score points and get bargains if they help you get there. Larry Fitzgerald went at #20 overall to NFL Fantasy Xtra, which was a great pick. We like Fitz much better with Derek Anderson throwing to him rather than Matt Leinart, as now seems to be a possibility.

Our Pick: Brandon Marshall. Yeah, we wonder whether Chad Henne can get him the ball for his 100 catches, but we'll take a throw of the dice here. This gave us two guys with 100 catches and our next pick will give us three.

Round Three

Junkyardjake grabbed the big/fast Packer TE with the first pick of the third round and #25 overall. Early, but Jermichael and Aaron have this thing going. It's a Red Zone thing, a 2nd and long thing...it's a thing. Finley is to big to be single teamed by a safety, he's too fast for a linebacker and he's physical enough to fight through double teams. And he's got this thing with Aaron Rodgers. It's still too early, but if I were facing 22 intermediate picks before I got a shot at him, I probably pull the trigger too. We loved the IDP Guru's draft, but we were not thrilled with DeSean Jackson in a Kevin Kolb offense. DeSean's scoring number were inflated by his return scores and as a general practice we advocate discounting players whose value is coming from special teams scores or score off turnovers. It's so unreliable and unpredictable plus it's a one week phenomena. Good player, great talent. In general I would hold off and let someone else pay this price.

Our Pick: Dallas Clark. 100 catches, bunch of scores, Peyton's target if other targets fail. We now have 300 catches from players who find the end zone and we like this.

Round Four

There were some typical question picks here. Pierre Thomas first (#37 overall) for Hatty Waiver Wire (terrific draft and a great dude) -- when he plays he scores and score well. Anquan Boldin (Lester's Legends Solid, solid draft) in the next pick -- health? New digs? Vernon Davis (Todd Farino, our kind host), obvious offensive focus but battling injuries all preseason. JunkyuardJake led the way again taking Hakeem Nicks with the last pick of the round followed by Jeremy Maclin in the #1 slot of the 5th round. Both "underachievers" last season but wowing everyone this preseason. We particularly like Nicks if he gets his groove on with Eli.

Our Pick: Matt Forte. 57 catches in a dreadful season and Mike Martz moving in with his dump it to Marshall Faulk offense. Forte is a great receiving back and we guess he takes third down time away from Chester Taylor more than Taylor takes first and second from him.

Round Five

WR round with the only exceptions being Jason Witten (IDP Guru) and Brent Celek (Pro Fantasy) finishing the tight end run and Lester's Legends going all Favre on us. RotoExperts grabbed Malcom Floyd who could step up to greatness with the questions surrounding Vincent Jackson. Todd Farino grabbed Wes Welker here. Welker is not 100% but that's value if he can play regularly.

Our Pick: Mike Sims-Walker. Bear in mind that Sims-Walker missed two games and was questionable in a couple of others so his game to game performance for active owners was quite a lot better than his yearly total. He's the man there now and should be a really excellent WR3 for us.

Rounds Six to Eight

The Xtreme Team's trio here was speculative, but upside amazing. Donald Driver the always productive Packer veteran should be reliable and a bargain here considering the number of Johnny Knox's and Michael Crabtrees that went before. Sure, at this point more talented, but they've never done what Driver has. Xtreme got Owen Daniels, the check-off from Andre Johnson for Schaub at TE and Eddie Royal. Royal is maddening because of course he could be PPR Gold. Will he develop with Orton? Tebow? He's mad man for PPR and with returns counting well it could be good.

Our Picks: Justin Forsett has won the first string job by most accounts and is also the passing down back. He's generally projected in site software based on a timeshare with Leon Washington. That's possible, but not likely. The 'Hawks love this guy and he's done nothing to change that opinion. Eli Manning. We have some fear here, but low 300 yard bonus level, 25 yard per point and interception penalty for the usually clean Manning convinced us he will score well this season, possibly very well. Jerome Harrison averaged 170 per game as a starter and fumbled twice all year. His presumptive challenger went down with a knee injury Thursday so unless the Browns suddenly find confidence in James Davis (who was publicly told that he had to play special teams well to make the club), he's going to play. 

Rounds Nine to Twelve

RotoExperts took Jacoby Jones here. We like this for the same reason we liked Owen Daniels. There's a ton of yards coming out of Schaub's arm and Jacoby is in a position to grab a lot of them A+ pick. We have serious doubts about Josh Freeman in Tampa as a passer, but Mike Williams (Tampa!) has looked so good it is hard to ignore. Kudos to JunkyardJake on that. NFLFantasy Xtra grabbed Louis Murphy. Hard to pimp a Raider Receiver, but with Jason Campbell under cneter it's not such a crazy idea. Michael Bush was the selection of the FantasyKnuckleheads -- he was in our queue too, but with Bush now scheduled to miss four to six weeks, it seems like a less good pick. Such is the joy of the last week here where regulars don't play and information is dribbled out by the teams.

Our Picks: Steve Slaton. Did you know that Arian Foster has not been named the starter? He almost certainly is, but Slaton is a strong, strong back who, aside from fumbling, does the things coaches like. Braylon Edwards Caught 80 for a bad QB in a bad offense a couple of years ago and will have the opportunity to establish himself as a #1. Sidney Rice will look good on the IR, or perhaps as serious fresh legs in the second half. Tim Hightower is generally ignored because he won't start but in PPR with a dicey QB? Maybe more than a bye-week fill.

Rounds thirteen on

Love JunkyardDog's Mike Thomas. Not a #1, but PPR filler. Farino's Sproles pick I love. With a rookie tailback and the superlative reciever Sproles who is known by Rivers? Good stuff. Jason Swist got Darren McFadden who is the starter since Bush is out 4-6. Chester Taylor was had by Xtreme Team in the last round. He's going to play and after last season if Forte falters, it could be a lot.

Our Picks: Pittsburgh Def. Lance Moore WR NO, Mike Williams SEA, Derek Anderson QB ARI, Josh Scobee.K JAC. Anderson may be the #1 with AZ trying to deal Leinart. Williams was playing first team minutes this week and has been used in red zone sets. Moore has been a favorite in NO and appears to be mostly healthy.

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