PPR Rookie Rankings (2 Viewers)

[Dan Hindery]

@Dan Hindery

I like most of your opinions in the OP, a couple i have thoughts on though;

Thomas at #8, dont necessarily disagree with the rank, I think however it is a great spot for a WR like him. Brees is getting older, quick throws are gonna be more common I think, and he is hopefully the DTish type guy in that offense for those situations, I think he is being under rated in PPR formats

Perkins is ranked way to low IMO

Higbee over Hooper?




 

I like Thomas and think it's a decent situation, but not as great of a spot as many others seem to think. The issue is that Brees spreads the ball around quite a bit and has always targeted his TEs and RBs heavily (which goes to your point about the short, quick throws). People will say Thomas steps in the Colston role, which makes sense. But Colston is coming off of a 45-520-4 season. Thomas would have to almost double those numbers to really get interesting from a fantasy perspective. Unless he siphons off a big chunk of targets from Cooks and Snead, I don't see how he gets there. And longer-term, Cooks isn't going anywhere and Brees is approaching 40 with Garrett Grayson looming as the heir apparent. 

Higbee vs. Hooper is close and I can see the argument either way. Hooper went almost a full-round earlier. But Higbee was recently arrested and you have to figure that hurt his draft stock by at least a round or two. From a pure talent perspective, you probably have to rank the two pretty closely. The two things that lead me to like Higbee a little better: (1) He's considered more of a pure pass-catcher while Hooper is more well-rounded. Seems like there's more upside with Higbee. (2) Julio Jones dominates that Atlanta offense with 200+ targets last year and Freeman is right there getting 100 targets. Sanu got over $6M per year and you figure he and Hooper end up vying for the remaining targets. Just hard to see a scenario where Hooper is a big-time fantasy player as the 3rd or 4th target in that offense. Meanwhile, the Rams pass-game hierarchy seems pretty wide-open. Tavon Austin will get his, but who else? Both Cooper and Higbee have a chance to possibly grab a major share of the targets. 

You might be right about Perkins. I think those late-4th and 5th round backs are going to kind of come down to personal preference and I'm not going to argue vehemently for guys I like (Dixon, Washington) over the other guys. Seems like the Giants have been content to use a RBBC lately and I guess my gut instinct is that Perkins is just added to the rotation, but not likely to ever be a 20-touch per game guy. 

 

[FreeBaGeL]

This was a really good thread to read for perspectives on how rookies are valued across leagues.

One thing that caught my eye was a general tendency to assume rookies will succeed while expressing "concerns" about players who have already done something (like EBF saying he was terrified of David Johnson having a top 5 dynasty ADP, yet the general consensus among the free world (not necessarily EBF) is that Elliot is already a top 5 dynasty RB. 

I think there is something to consider in that.

I don't think there is anything to it other than some people finally beginning to understand that these guys who vault to the top of dynasty drafts based on less than a season's worth of performance are the most dangerous assets in fantasy. 

RBs drafted in the top 5 of the nfl draft are significantly less risky than the David Johnsons, Jeremy Hills, CJ Andersons, Monterey Balls, etc of the world. 

 

[EBF]

This was a really good thread to read for perspectives on how rookies are valued across leagues.

One thing that caught my eye was a general tendency to assume rookies will succeed while expressing "concerns" about players who have already done something (like EBF saying he was terrified of David Johnson having a top 5 dynasty ADP, yet the general consensus among the free world (not necessarily EBF) is that Elliot is already a top 5 dynasty RB. 

I think there is something to consider in that.

People emphasize different things when they try to assess the value of young players who aren't really known quantities. How much stock do you put in things like rookie performance vs. things like draft position? Johnson showed nice flashes last year and was a reasonably high draft pick (3rd round). On the other hand, Elliott was a top 5 pick as a RB and that puts him in elite company. So do you take the guy who is "proven" or the guy who is billed to be great? I tend to trust draft slot more than I trust small sample size results, but these dilemmas can be challenging and I don't know that there's one simple way to solve them.

Just think about how challenging it is to identify similar historical comparisons for Johnson. Which criteria would you use? Would you compare him to other rookie RBs who scored X amount of FF points? Would you factor in his draft slot? Would you factor in his combine numbers? Would you factor in the amount of receptions he had as a rookie? Depending on the variables you use to define him, your list of similar players is probably going to vary drastically. I can see a case for being really high on him. I can also see a case for being really leery of him.

I've said all of this before, but with veterans it is relatively easy to know what you're getting. Guys like Brandon Marshall and Larry Fitzgerald have been around long enough that we know what one of their average seasons looks like. On the other hand, guys like Johnson and Elliott are total unknowns. When you try to project their career performance, you don't have much to "fill in the blanks" with. I think this is why sophomore RBs can be so badly overrated. If they come in and do decently well, there's a tendency to assume that this small window performance will be the constant story for their entire career. So we end up projecting awesome careers for people like Doug Martin, Steve Slaton, Tre Mason, Julius Jones, and Anthony Thomas when the reality ends up being more turbulent. 

I personally wouldn't touch David Johnson at his dynasty ADP. It's nothing against the player. I just don't see much upside when he's being valued pretty close to his ceiling on the basis of a decent, but not great draft slot and a good rookie year in which he was a part-time player. I would feel a little bit more comfortable with Elliott since the tradition of RBs drafted in the top 5-10 is so strong. I also think his dynasty value will be more durable on the basis of name recognition. If he has a bad year, people will still remember the draft hype. If David Johnson has a bad year, he goes from 100 to Andre Ellington real quick. 

 

[onionsack]

One of my personal philosophies is that consistently betting you are a better judge of NFL talent that the NFL people making the picks (who spend way more time and have way more information) will cause you to go broke.

 

[Shutout]

I don't think there is anything to it other than some people finally beginning to understand that these guys who vault to the top of dynasty drafts based on less than a season's worth of performance are the most dangerous assets in fantasy. 

RBs drafted in the top 5 of the nfl draft are significantly less risky than the David Johnsons, Jeremy Hills, CJ Andersons, Monterey Balls, etc of the world. 

I understand your point but it should be noted it goes both ways, depending on how we cherry-pick our list.  Yours lumped an extremely successful David Johnson (not just promising, but exceptional when he played full time) with a couple of busts. 

But what if we flipped the script and I put a list together that is the exact same criteria (saw a glimpse one year of a NON-highly drafted guy that came back the following year with people saying they had "concerns")?

David Johnson, Arian Foster, Eddie Lacy, DeMarco Murray.  Suddenly, that list seems to say "if you saw a late-season glimpse and had the guts to believe it would carry over, you probably won a few titles. 

Of course, we both picked the names that helped our opinion here and it is always going to be one way or another, hitting and missing.  But my point, overall is when you see a guy that has at least done something in the NFL versus building up a guy with potential (which a friend of mine always tells me is a French word that means "hasn't done #### yet"), then we should recognize that just because he came with a bandwagon doesn't mean he can pull the load.  There are Trent Richardsons, Cedric Bensons, Phillip Lawrences, etc that ultimately disappointed out there despite being highly thought of in terms of talents. 

All that being said, I ge thte thoughts on Elliot. I think they might be true.  But I would not, in any world, automatically put Elliot higher than David Johnson at this point. If for no other reason, I trust the real world people that coach anf GM the Cards more than I trust Jerry Jones at this point (and I generally speak favorably of Jerry and his team...just trying to be realistic).

 

[Shutout]

People emphasize different things when they try to assess the value of young players who aren't really known quantities. How much stock do you put in things like rookie performance vs. things like draft position? Johnson showed nice flashes last year and was a reasonably high draft pick (3rd round). On the other hand, Elliott was a top 5 pick as a RB and that puts him in elite company. So do you take the guy who is "proven" or the guy who is billed to be great? I tend to trust draft slot more than I trust small sample size results, but these dilemmas can be challenging and I don't know that there's one simple way to solve them.

Just think about how challenging it is to identify similar historical comparisons for Johnson. Which criteria would you use? Would you compare him to other rookie RBs who scored X amount of FF points? Would you factor in his draft slot? Would you factor in his combine numbers? Would you factor in the amount of receptions he had as a rookie? Depending on the variables you use to define him, your list of similar players is probably going to vary drastically. I can see a case for being really high on him. I can also see a case for being really leery of him.

I've said all of this before, but with veterans it is relatively easy to know what you're getting. Guys like Brandon Marshall and Larry Fitzgerald have been around long enough that we know what one of their average seasons looks like. On the other hand, guys like Johnson and Elliott are total unknowns. When you try to project their career performance, you don't have much to "fill in the blanks" with. I think this is why sophomore RBs can be so badly overrated. If they come in and do decently well, there's a tendency to assume that this small window performance will be the constant story for their entire career. So we end up projecting awesome careers for people like Doug Martin, Steve Slaton, Tre Mason, Julius Jones, and Anthony Thomas when the reality ends up being more turbulent. 

I personally wouldn't touch David Johnson at his dynasty ADP. It's nothing against the player. I just don't see much upside when he's being valued pretty close to his ceiling on the basis of a decent, but not great draft slot and a good rookie year in which he was a part-time player. I would feel a little bit more comfortable with Elliott since the tradition of RBs drafted in the top 5-10 is so strong. I also think his dynasty value will be more durable on the basis of name recognition. If he has a bad year, people will still remember the draft hype. If David Johnson has a bad year, he goes from 100 to Andre Ellington real quick. 

Your entire viewpoint reminds me of what I used to read non-stop about Arian Foster and, in the beginning about, LaDanian Tomlinson.  For whatever reason, when a guy splashes HUGE, it just can not be accepted by people. They tend to think that it's an outlier not capable of being sustained. I think that point of view is very valid but I don't know how it holds up when the other side of the argument is you are essentially saying that you trust potential and hype more than you trust what actually did happen.  Johnson did everything we saw.  We know he can play in this league on that team and be used A  LOT and be successful at it.  Elliot has the same hype that Trent Richardson had but he's also done about as much as Trent Richardson has at this point.  He may come out and be Adrian Peterson. Who Knows (which, by the FF numbers, is still less than DJ given the short comparison window) but the point is the "eyeball" test shouldn't be discarded.  We have seen one guy do something in the NFL at a high level. We THINK the other guy will. 

I guess my entire thought on this is I don't see how someone can say they are concerned or worried about something that happened and was done well but seemingly have not one single "what if" or worry about a guy that doesn't have a resume.  Mistakes are made at the NFL level. The draft slot doesn't override production on the field.  SOmewhere in history somebody selected Jamarcus Russel #1 and Tom Brady in the 6th.  If you go by draft slot, you are going to be miserable a lot.

 

[EBF]

  If you go by draft slot, you are going to be miserable a lot.

You're going to be miserable a lot no matter which method you use to assess young players. It's hard for me to take your post seriously because you've cherry picked the examples that fit your narrative (i.e. Richardson/Brady) without talking about the general odds, which are far more important. We know that some 6th round NFL draft picks turn out to become great players like Tom Brady, but it's hardly the norm.

David Johnson had 161 touches last season. He did extremely well with those touches (especially as a receiver), but there's a decent argument that it's impossible for a player to prove anything on such a small workload. He is not an established commodity like Jamaal Charles or LeSean McCoy. He's a guy who looked really good in limited duty and might be able to do it on a full workload over an extended time period. His own teammate Andre Ellington is walking proof that not all of those guys are going to be able to make the jump from part-time star to dominant workhorse. I think he has a chance to be another Matt Forte. Is it worth his current price tag in dynasty? Not for me. I wouldn't take him there because I think there's very little upside at his current ADP and lots of risk.

I get what you're saying about Elliott being less proven, but to me the track record of backs taken in the top 10 of the draft is stronger than the track record of mediocre prospects who flashed in limited duty. So while it might not seem to make sense, in this case I would take the guy who hasn't played an NFL snap over the guy who is more "proven".

 

[Biabreakable]

Just to try to give this conversations some numbers and context here is some data of RB drafted from 2002 to 2016. These numbers evaluate how many RB drafted by round end up having at least one top 12 season. The total RB drafted by round. Then how many have more than one season of top 12(ish) production.

1st round 19 of 33 had a top 12 season 58%

2nd round 8 of 37 had a top 12 season 22%

3rd round 8 of 32 had a top 12 season 25%

4th round 6 of 52 had a top 12 season 12%

5th round 2 of 30 had a top 12 season 7%

6th round 3 of 45 had a top 12 season 7%

7th round 2 of 52 had a top 12 season 4%


Round


Total


Average


 


 


 


1


34


2.27


2


38


2.53


3


34


2.27


4


54


3.60


5


36


2.40


6


48


3.20


7


56


3.73


 


 


 


 


300


20.00



The percentage of RB having more than one top 12 season by round is

Round one 36%

Round two 22%

Round three 9%

Round four 2%

Round five 3%

Round six 2%

Round seven 0%

So the odds of ANY RB having a top 12 season is low and the odds of them having more than one top 12 season is even lower. RB drafted in the first round are about 3 times more likely to have at least one top 12 season and to have more than one of these seasons.

If you were to apply this to Elliot and David Johnsonm Johnson has one top 12 season already as a rookie (although usage was sporadic) and has a 9% chance of having another top 12 season. Elliot has a 58% chance of having one top 12 season and a 36% chance of having multiple top 12 seasons. if I break the historical data to show only top 5 picks at the RB position, Elliots odds are even higher. Top 5 picks at RB if they have one top 12 season are likely to have four or more of these seasons.

Now this is just draft position without considering other factors, such as Dallas offensive line, aging QB and commitment to running the ball, how well Elliot does in pass protection and catching the ball.

 

[Catbird]

Saying Johnson has a 9% chance of a second top 12 season is a ridiculous twist of the numbers. Even if you think percentages for the group of players following one path or the other is the way to make a Johnson v. Elliott decision, you would have to look at the percentage of guys who already HAD a top 12 season, or who had one as a rookie, to see how likely a second is, not at all backs who have or haven't but were 3rd rounders. My take is that the situation for both guys is very good. The numbers for guys who have had Johnson's half season and who have been picked like Zeke are good, but both still carry substantial risk. Lots of guys have succeeded and lots have failed from both situations. I don't think the numbers for these groups, though, tell you which to pick. For me the decision comes down to the individual guy, his situation and eye balls on the players. I think trying to decide this by other guys who have been in similar situations only gets you to whether there is reason for great hope - and I think there is that, with substantial risk, for both. At that point, discussing the guys is worth a lot more than discussing what other people have done with different skills from more or less similar situations.

 

[Biabreakable]

Saying Johnson has a 9% chance of a second top 12 season is a ridiculous twist of the numbers. Even if you think percentages for the group of players following one path or the other is the way to make a Johnson v. Elliott decision, you would have to look at the percentage of guys who already HAD a top 12 season, or who had one as a rookie, to see how likely a second is, not at all backs who have or haven't but were 3rd rounders. My take is that the situation for both guys is very good. The numbers for guys who have had Johnson's half season and who have been picked like Zeke are good, but both still carry substantial risk. Lots of guys have succeeded and lots have failed from both situations. I don't think the numbers for these groups, though, tell you which to pick. For me the decision comes down to the individual guy, his situation and eye balls on the players. I think trying to decide this by other guys who have been in similar situations only gets you to whether there is reason for great hope - and I think there is that, with substantial risk, for both. At that point, discussing the guys is worth a lot more than discussing what other people have done with different skills from more or less similar situations.

I agree with that. My sample may not be large enough as well, I just took what PFR gave me as a default. Bear in mind that the average number of top 12 seasons for ALL RB (using 25 years of data) was two seasons.

So lets look at the 3rd round RB who did have top 12 season.

DeMarco Murray has 2 top 12 seasons.

Stevan Ridley had one.

Shonn Greene had one.

Jamal Charles had five. 

Steve Slaton had one.

Frank Gore had eight (many of his were RB 13 to 15 but was close enough for me)

Brian Westbrook had four.

This is what those odds are derived from.

I would say Johnson is not simialar to Ridley and Greene. 

I am not sure how to calculate the odds for David Johnson having another top 12 season. Open tp suggestions.I think his chances are better than Ridley's or Greene's chances were (they got there on volume and TDs) 

I don't mean for any of these numbers to be a sole data point to make decisions on. It is only one factor, looking at draft position. Of course you need to consider everything else that you think is relevant to the players short term and long term performance.

 

[JFS171]

On David Johnson and reasons for skepticism... He was very much a part time player till late in the year, and while I generally hate the "well if X big game or Y big play didn't happen," sentiments, I think it's worth noting he dropped 187 yards rushing and 3 TDs on Philly in week 15 last year.  Outside of that game, he had 489 yards rushing on 126 carries, good for 3.88 YPC.  Again - the game happened, so we can't completely discount it.  I just think Martin owners being offered top 3-4 dynasty RB prices after his rookie year would probably like to go back in time and sell high after he had a similarly huge game against Oakland inflating his numbers.

I personally would take Zeke over DJ in a heartbeat...

 

[Biabreakable]

On David Johnson and reasons for skepticism... He was very much a part time player till late in the year, and while I generally hate the "well if X big game or Y big play didn't happen," sentiments, I think it's worth noting he dropped 187 yards rushing and 3 TDs on Philly in week 15 last year.  Outside of that game, he had 489 yards rushing on 126 carries, good for 3.88 YPC.  Again - the game happened, so we can't completely discount it.  I just think Martin owners being offered top 3-4 dynasty RB prices after his rookie year would probably like to go back in time and sell high after he had a similarly huge game against Oakland inflating his numbers.

I personally would take Zeke over DJ in a heartbeat...

David Johnson game logs.

He had 2 good games against the Rams and the Vikings which shows evidence of him being a good performing starter. Those games were not as prolific as the game against the Eagles who had a terrible defense last season. 29 carries and 4 receptions is certainly an outlier. But also an example of his upside in favorable match up being really high.

Then you have two pretty poor games running the ball against Green Bay and Seattle, but Johnson does have 88 yards receiving against Green Bay making this still a good game from him.

The two playoff games following that he is targeted 9 times in both. He struggles for yards a bit but still put up decent games for fantasy.

Now the danger is extrapolating a small sample size into a year long projection. As utilization goes up generally efficiency goes down. 

The Eagles game is 23% of his regular season rushing attempts. So that is a bit of a problem as it has too much weight in the overall sample. I would be leery of projections that only include the good games or just the last seven games of the season (including playoffs) when he was used more and discard numbers from before that. Because then the Philly game would be 24% of the rushing attempts in the used sample.

 

[kutta]

It's not just the numbers with DJ. It's the "buzz" too. Arians has said that he could be one of the best of all time, and he doesn't just throw things out like that. DJ has the complete support of his team and the coaches believe in him. That's a big deal for future production because he's going to be given the chance to succeed. We have no idea how Zeke will fit in at Dallas and how the coaches will use him. We all *think* it's going to be great. But we *know* it's great with DJ.

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000638149/article/arians-david-johnson-can-be-one-of-the-alltime-best

 

[JohnnyU]

Some of you give great headache.

 

[nirad3]

Some of you give great headache.

  My same sentiments....

Wow.  I'm in 5 dynasty leagues and feel that I take this ish seriously, but reading some of this makes me think that perhaps, just perhaps, y'all are combing the gnat's asshair just a little too much.

Great read, but whoa.

 

[FreeBaGeL]

I understand your point but it should be noted it goes both ways, depending on how we cherry-pick our list.  Yours lumped an extremely successful David Johnson (not just promising, but exceptional when he played full time) with a couple of busts. 

But what if we flipped the script and I put a list together that is the exact same criteria (saw a glimpse one year of a NON-highly drafted guy that came back the following year with people saying they had "concerns")?

David Johnson, Arian Foster, Eddie Lacy, DeMarco Murray.  Suddenly, that list seems to say "if you saw a late-season glimpse and had the guts to believe it would carry over, you probably won a few titles. 

Of course, we both picked the names that helped our opinion here and it is always going to be one way or another, hitting and missing.  But my point, overall is when you see a guy that has at least done something in the NFL versus building up a guy with potential (which a friend of mine always tells me is a French word that means "hasn't done #### yet"), then we should recognize that just because he came with a bandwagon doesn't mean he can pull the load.  There are Trent Richardsons, Cedric Bensons, Phillip Lawrences, etc that ultimately disappointed out there despite being highly thought of in terms of talents. 

All that being said, I ge thte thoughts on Elliot. I think they might be true.  But I would not, in any world, automatically put Elliot higher than David Johnson at this point. If for no other reason, I trust the real world people that coach anf GM the Cards more than I trust Jerry Jones at this point (and I generally speak favorably of Jerry and his team...just trying to be realistic).

You're right that there are examples of both in both situations.

My assertion is that if you actually took all the entire lists (say, rookie RBs drafted in the top 5 of the NFL draft vs. non-rookie RBs going 1st round in dynasty startups with ~8 or fewer career starts) that the bust rate would be higher for the "vets" than the rookies, despite the assertion that those guys are "proven" and the rookies are not.

Now, I've been too lazy to run the numbers again and lord knows I can't use the search function of this board well enough to find the post where I actually did run the numbers ~5 years ago so I can't say for sure.  But I think a worst case scenario is that the rookies are statistically equally likely to bust and realistically are a fair amount less likely to bust, yet the assumption that most people make is that the 2nd year guys are "safer".  To the contrary, my hypothesis at least is that those 2nd year guys may be the most risky and least safe group of players in all of fantasy football.

Maybe one day I'll get off my butt and actually run some numbers again.

 

[FreeBaGeL]

  My same sentiments....

Wow.  I'm in 5 dynasty leagues and feel that I take this ish seriously, but reading some of this makes me think that perhaps, just perhaps, y'all are combing the gnat's asshair just a little too much.

Great read, but whoa.

Let's face it, anyone spending any amount of time on a fantasy football internet message board in May is some kind of geek or another.  Arguing about the levels of our dorkdom seems a bit silly.

 

[Biabreakable]

  My same sentiments....

Wow.  I'm in 5 dynasty leagues and feel that I take this ish seriously, but reading some of this makes me think that perhaps, just perhaps, y'all are combing the gnat's asshair just a little too much.

Great read, but whoa.

That's fair.

I have been doing this for over 25 years now and I think I learn stuff every year.

 

[Dan Hindery]

I'm going to update my dynasty rankings once I finish a devy article this weekend and I'm probably going to have Zeke ranked just a little bit ahead of David Johnson.

Johnson is probably a safer bet. We already saw him dominate at the NFL level for half a season. We think Zeke can do the same, but won't know for sure until we actually see it.

Zeke has a little bit more dynasty upside though because he is 3.5 years younger than David Johnson. Zeke is 20 (21 in July) and DJ is 24 (25 in December). If Zeke has a big season, his value is going to shoot way up and he has a shot to be the #1 overall startup pick at this time next year when he'll be 21-years old. If DJ has a big season, he'll be a first-round startup pick next year, but as a 25-year old RB might have a tough time passing up Gurley, Bell and the young receivers. 

 

[Hankmoody]

5. Derrick Henry- Went and looked at the details of Murray's contract. I look at it as $12M in 2016 with options years in 2017 and 2018 of just $3M each. Unless he falls off a cliff (definitely possible), good chance that DeMarco hangs around for a few years and makes this a RBBC for a while. If you're drafting Henry here, it's more of a long-term bet on his talent (or because you don't like any of the other options).

I see how you break this out, but worth noting those "options" are dead money.  His 2017 $6.25M is guaranteed.  Not that that's deal-breaker money but it reinforces your point that he's going to be there two years minimum.  He has zero dead money after 2017 so it may only be a two year wait (and could be one if they want to split that cap hit like you account for).  I'm focusing my evaluation of him strictly on his talent (which I still haven't figured out) and not Murray's presence.

 

[Dan Hindery]

I see how you break this out, but worth noting those "options" are dead money.  His 2017 $6.25M is guaranteed.  Not that that's deal-breaker money but it reinforces your point that he's going to be there two years minimum.  He has zero dead money after 2017 so it may only be a two year wait (and could be one if they want to split that cap hit like you account for).  I'm focusing my evaluation of him strictly on his talent (which I still haven't figured out) and not Murray's presence.




 




 

There was some discussion about this on page one, but according to OTC, only half of his 2017 salary is guaranteed. And almost half of his 2018 salary becomes guaranteed next March. So he actually will have $3M of dead money going into the summer of 2018 and their decision will be whether to pay him the unguaranteed part of the salary ($3.5M) or cut him and eat the $3M of guaranteed salary.

I think the easiest way to look at it is like this (numbers rounded):

-cut him before March 2017, they owe him $12M total

-Cut him before March 2018, they owe him $15M total

-Cut him before march 2019, they owe him $18M totl

 

[Biabreakable]

Teams can always restructure contracts and push the guaranteed money into the current year by doing so if the player agrees.

Teams seem willing to waste money on coaches and players at times as well when they make organizational changes. Will Mularkey be the HC of the Titans in 2017?

I recall being convinced of Christine Michael getting opportunity because of how Lynch's contract was structured. They just redid his deal and ended up trading away Michael last year. I don't think those numbers are set in stone.

 

[Dan Hindery]

Probably will do a little update on these rankings soon and am going to add Josh Ferguson in the top 30.

He was undrafted, but he's a talented pass-catcher out of the backfield. Plus, that Indy RB depth chart is brutal. Love Ferguson's chances of making the team and maybe making an impact as a rookie in PPR leagues. 

 

[Hankmoody]

There's still a part of me that finds it absurd to consider taking a 4th-5th round RB over a guy who went #1 or #2 in the NFL draft. My issue with the likes of Dixon/Howard/Washington is that 10 guys of that caliber enter the league every season. Even if you happen to get one useful season out of them, the odds of them doing a Zac Stacy are so high. These guys are imminently replaceable and so what you're really drafting is the opportunity and the vague hope that the player in question will show enough to dissuade his team for dipping back into the draft pool for a superior talent the next year (i.e. the Stacy --> Mason --> Gurley food chain). I've always had a lot of trouble pulling the trigger on those players, even if they can pan out sometimes.

They don't have to pan out.  You can make a fortune flipping those red-hot RB's.  A large percentage of RB's flash at some point and you get a free preview (wouldn't we love to have a look forward right now?) to decide if he's a replaceable talent in a good situation (Buck Allen) or just a legit guy people didn't see enough of (David Johnson).  You can flip the pretenders and keep the real deals.  Andrew Luck aside I haven't seen a QB come along that you couldn't get for a Matt Jones or Karlos Williams that was on a roll and still have equity left to pick up extra picks or players.  Karlos Williams was traded for a future 1st and 2nd, Jeremy Hill was traded last spring with the 1.04 for 1.01 (Gurley) and future 1st (1.02, Treadwell).

 

[Hankmoody]

There was some discussion about this on page one, but according to OTC, only half of his 2017 salary is guaranteed. And almost half of his 2018 salary becomes guaranteed next March. So he actually will have $3M of dead money going into the summer of 2018 and their decision will be whether to pay him the unguaranteed part of the salary ($3.5M) or cut him and eat the $3M of guaranteed salary.

I think the easiest way to look at it is like this (numbers rounded):

-cut him before March 2017, they owe him $12M total

-Cut him before March 2018, they owe him $15M total

-Cut him before march 2019, they owe him $18M totl

You Someone originally quoted Sportstrac which shows 2017 salary guaranteed fully and nothing after that, but it is a very similar net effect.  The good news for Henry owners is that once this season is over, they only carry $6M dead on Murray.  And if they make him a post-June 1 cut they can spread that out after two years which is very manageable.  There's not a big enough financial committment to him to get in Henry's way, and he's got a decent chance of not having Murray to contend with in 2017.
 

 

[Hankmoody]

Regarding the NFL having more insight into these guys than the fantasy community, just based on recollection it seems like when the fantasy community is generally down on a player that was drafted highly in the NFL, the fantasy community ends up being right a majority of the time.  In fact I'm struggling to think of a guy that was drafted disproportionally lowly in fantasy drafts compared to the NFL draft (relative to other skill position players) where the player actually ended up being good, especially good for fantasy.  

The poster boy for this is of course Darrius Heyward-Bey who I believe had a fantasy ADP all the way back in the 2nd round despite being a top 10 pick in the NFL draft and the first WR/RB taken.

Part of what drives this is that NFL teams aren't drafting for fantasy football, they are drafting to fill roles and fit systems. A guy like Fuller might only catch 50 passes but if he stretches the field and makes their punter fire the ball out of bounds and kickoffs get drilled for 25 yard touchbacks that's a successful investment for an NFL team.  DeSean Jackson is probably the post child here.  What he does to secondaries is far more valuable to the team than getting 30 more catches for 250 yards and elevating PPR owners to cloud nine. A TE that can block might get himself drafted 2 rounds earlier to a team like SEA that values a balanced skillset but that doesn't help us.

 

[cr8f]

Browns: Browns coveted Princeton TE Seth DeValve for his mismatch potential http://www.clevelandbrowns.com/news/article-5/Browns-coveted-Princeton-TE-Seth-DeValve-for-his-mismatch-potential/5a909812-3da8-478a-9032-5a6d0a172eb9?campaign=cle:fanshare:twitter via @Browns

 

[nirad3]

Let's face it, anyone spending any amount of time on a fantasy football internet message board in May is some kind of geek or another.  Arguing about the levels of our dorkdom seems a bit silly.

  No one's arguing anything.  Just because it's a statement on a message board doesn't mean it's intended to pick a fight or ... "argue".

If anything I am just totally impressed by the level of detail.  I've been doing this a long time, consider myself a huge fantasy football geek, but continue to be wowed by the level of detail some of y'all get into.

That's all, no argument from me.  Now take out your 100-sided die and roll dammit!