Ranking the Rankers: Fantasy Gurus Beware

The following article is a contribution from Randal LaBine at Mascot Radio. He does a weekly ranking of how fantasy gurus from around the web do in their predictions each week. He uses a simple formula, he takes each gurus Top 10 players at a position each week (10 RBs, 10 QBs) and sees how they actually do on Sunday, then adds those points together for a ranking. For more on the formula, go here. It’s simple, but a cool way of seeing who you should be taking fantasy advice from.

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The job of the fantasy football guru is only getting more difficult. This is the part of the season where trends are emerging--some trustworthy, some not. It is the guru whose job is to tell us who is for real (McGahee? Cedric Benson?!), who is fading away (Larry Johnson?), and who will bounce back (Slaton?). Let’s see how they did in Week 3.
TOP 10 QBs: Peyton Manning, Kolb, Rodgers, Schaub, Campbell, Favre, Flacco, Cutler, Big Ben (you know him, I’m not typing that last name), Rivers.
For the 2nd week in a row, there’s Kolb in the top 10. That seems to say a lot about the Philly offense, and the overhyped nature of Vick and the Eagle-cat. Notable absences here are Brees and Brady.
1. ESPN Projections, 191.69. Dead last on QBs after Week 2, first in Week 3.
2. Richard (CBS), 186.21. Only guru to put both Cutler and Big Ben in top 10.
3. CBS Projections, 183.98. Even with Sanchez and Eli, a good score for CBS.
4. Berry (ESPN), 183.55. So close to 3rd place! Berry was the only guru to go with Flacco.
5. Behrens (Yahoo), 182.58. Only guru who was also in the top 5 ranking QBs last week. Behrens is to be trusted regarding signal callers!
Dishonorable Mention: Evans (Yahoo), 161.31. One pick put Evans in the basement--Trent Edwards. The Saints D was better than expected, and T.O. was a no-show.

TOP 10 RBs: MJD, Pierre Thomas, T. Choice, Julius Jones, Fred Taylor, W. Parker, S. Jackson, McGahee, K. Smith, McCoy.
Plenty of new faces among the top 10 RBs. No Adrian Peterson, but of course you needed to play him. The gurus who trusted S. Jackson and McGahee did well.
1. Richard, 145.50. He was 4th best picking RBs last week, and now he’s on top. He had MJD at 1, and made good calls on McGahee and McCoy.
2. Behrens, 144.05. Edged out Eisenberg by 0.20 points. They had 9 identical picks, but Behrens had Ronnie Brown, who scored 0.20 more than Slaton.
3. Eisenberg (CBS), 143.85. See Behrens.
4. Evans (Yahoo), 142. Evans was 3rd best on RBs last week, solid again.
5. Yahoo Projections, 138.85. There always seems to be a decent showing by a computer algorithm.
Dishonorable Mention: SI Projections, 115.30. Sure, the Gore pick hurts, but injuries happen in fantasy football and some astute gurus avoided gimpy Frank against the Vikes. The more damaging picks were Hightower and Sproles instead of McGahee and S. Jackson.

TOP 10 WRs: S. Moss, D. Jackson, Wayne, Mason, Cotchery, Walter, Driver, R. Moss, Burleson, V. Jackson
Weird week for WRs. Many of the usual suspects underperformed (AJ, Steve Smith, Roddy White) while guys like Cotchery, Driver, and Burleson continued to impress. This is why I don’t like drafting a WR too early.
1. ESPN Projections, 125.75. ESPN easily won this category. They were the only ones to project Driver and DeSean Jackson in the top 10 WRs
2. Seven Gurus Tied at 112.4. Hmmm, I sense a lack of imagination here. Seven gurus had the same WRs in their top 10. Is it a sign of failing to play the matchups? That’s a dangerous game, but it worked for ESPN this week (last week, they were the dishonorable mention!).
Dishonorable Mention: SI Projections. The second dishonorable mention for SI. That’s what happens when you rank Ted Ginn in your top 10.
Overall Guru Rankings for Week 3
Here are the rankings for all the gurus along with the total points they scored when adding up their top 10 QBs, RBs, and WRs. Interestingly, human gurus were niether the best nor the worst this week--just like last week.
1. ESPN Projections, 453.36.
2. Richard, 440.71.
3. Behrens, 439.03.
4. CBS Projections, 430.68
5. Eisenberg, 428.86
6. Berry, 425.75
7. Kuselias, 423.81
8. Funston, 422.57
9. ESPN Composite, 420.03
10. Yahoo Projections, 418.60
11. Yahoo Composite, 417.94
12. NFL.com, 415.53
13. Karabell, 411.78
14. Rotter, 409.83
15. Evans, 406.86
16. Piankowski, 401.88
17. Harris, 397.79
18. SI Projections, 376.90
Soon I can start looking at how each guru is performing over time. For now, a quick observation. The website projections, which appear to give more weight to matchups than most humans, are quite volatile. ESPN projections were the worst last week and the best this week. Do you want that sort of boom and bust? On the other hand, many gurus tend to stick with the best players no matter the matchup--more consistent, but is that giving you an edge? It’s unbelievable that 7 gurus had the same top 10 WRs for Week 3.