2017 rookie pick 2.01 post NFL draft (Closed) (1 Viewer)

Now that the NFL draft is complete and we have had a few days to let things sink in, lets find out what the SP thinks of the rookies and where they stack up against each other for fantasy.

I decided to expand to four different polls post NFL draft, as now we can consider how each player fits with their teams and what that may mean in terms of fantasy points. 

I am populating the poll from my own rankings, with the exception of the 2QB poll where I will slot the top 3 QB choices at all times. If a player is not listed that you think should be, please recommend that they be added to the appropriate poll. If you would vote for a player who is not listed please vote other and post who you voted for, and that player will be added to the next poll.

Discussion welcome. Thanks everyone for voting.

Previous polls

Poll 1.01

Poll 1.02

Poll 1.03

Poll 1.04

Pick 1.05

Pick 1.06

Pick 1.07

Pick 1.08

Pick 1.09

Pick 1,10

Pick 1.11

Pick 1.12

Results so far:

Standard

1.01 Leonard Fournette 65.8% at 123 votes

1.02 Corey Davis 41.4% at 74 votes

1.03 Joe Mixon 37.7% at 81 votes

1.04 Christian McCaffrey 47.8% at 105 votes

1.05 Dalvin Cook 70.3% at 71 votes

1.06 Mike Williams 55.3% at 82 votes

1.07 OJ Howard 36.2% at 76 votes

1.08 Kareem Hunt 26.2% at 71 votes

1.09 Samajae Perine 25% at 86 votes

1.10 John Ross 29.8% at 65 votes

1.11 Alvin Kamara 23.5% at 60 votes

1.12 David Njoku 22.8% at 83 votes (tie broken based on TE Premium poll and MFL ADP )

2.01 Evan Engram 37.3% at 61 votes

PPR

1.01 Corey Davis 40.4% at 123 votes

1.02 Leonard Fournette 55.7% at 74 votes

1.03 Christian McCaffrey 66.2% at 81 votes

1.04 Joe Mixon 51.1% at 105 votes

1.05 Dalvin Cook 70.3% at 71 votes

1.06 Mike Williams 62.4% at 82 votes

1.07 OJ Howard 55.1% at 76 votes

1.08 John Ross 26.2% at 71 votes

1.09 Kareem Hunt 18.8% at 86 votes

1.10 Alvin Kamara 29.8% at 65 votes

1.11 Evan Engram 31.4% at 60 votes

1.12 David Njoku 34.2% at 83 votes

2.01 Zay Jones 33.9% at 61 votes

2QB

1.01 Leonard Fournette 31.6% at 123 votes

1.02 Corey Davis 28.6% at 74 votes

1.03 Christian McCaffrey 31.2% at 81 votes

1.04 Joe Mixon 28.9% at 105 votes

1.05 Dalvin Cook 29.7% at 71 votes

1.06 Mike Williams 19.7% at 82 votes

1.07 Deshaun Watson 17.4% at 76 votes

1.08 OJ Howard 26.2% at 71 votes

1.09 Patrick Mahomes 18.8% at 86 votes

1.10 Mitch Trubisky 15,8% at 65 votes

1.11 Alvin Kamara 9.8% at 60 votes

1.12 Samajae Perine 11.4% at 83 votes

2.01 Evan Engram 15.3% at 61 votes

TE premium

1.01 Leonard Fournette 35% at 123 votes

1.02 Corey Davis 37.1% at 74 votes

1.03 Christian McCaffrey 36.4% at 81 votes

1.04 Joe Mixon 33.3% at 105 votes

1.05 Dalvin Cook 34.4% at 71 votes

1.06 OJ Howard 48.7% at 82 votes

1.07 Mike Williams 33.3% at 76 votes

1.08 David Njoku 29.5% at 71 votes

1.09 Evan Engram 46.3% at 86 votes

1.10 John Ross 26.3% at 65 votes

1.11 Alvin Kamara 19.6% at 60 votes

1.12 Samajae Perine 19% at 83 votes

2.01 Kareem Hunt 32.2% at 61 votes

Poll 2.02 can be found here

I didn't want to break a tie and it was hard to as Njoku had won the TE premium poll but Engram had won the PPR poll, a split decision. I ultimately let the ADP break that tie.

Needless to say, it is close between these two players and this could go either way in your drafts.

Biabreakable said:

I didn't want to break a tie and it was hard to as Njoku had won the TE premium poll but Engram had won the PPR poll, a split decision. I ultimately let the ADP break that tie.

Needless to say, it is close between these two players and this could go either way in your drafts.

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Good call on your part. You probably could have left it open for another week and there wouldn't have been much separation 

2.01 is a bad spot to be picking in PPR. This pick seems like a tossup between about 8 different guys (including Trubisky & Everett, who aren't listed yet). I'd be trying hard to trade down if I was on the clock here.

ZWK said:

2.01 is a bad spot to be picking in PPR. This pick seems like a tossup between about 8 different guys (including Trubisky & Everett, who aren't listed yet). I'd be trying hard to trade down if I was on the clock here.

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I would be pretty excited for Zay Jones. 

Borden said:

ZWK said:

2.01 is a bad spot to be picking in PPR. This pick seems like a tossup between about 8 different guys (including Trubisky & Everett, who aren't listed yet). I'd be trying hard to trade down if I was on the clock here.

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I would be pretty excited for Zay Jones. 

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I would be pretty excited to trade you the pick. (My thoughts on Jones.)

Skeletore Eh said:

Good call on your part. You probably could have left it open for another week and there wouldn't have been much separation 

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Yeah even if one of them would have gotten ahead a vote or two at some point, it was going to continue going back and forth for awhile.

ZWK said:

2.01 is a bad spot to be picking in PPR. This pick seems like a tossup between about 8 different guys (including Trubisky & Everett, who aren't listed yet). I'd be trying hard to trade down if I was on the clock here.

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2.01 is close to the end of a tier for me.  2 players left in JuJu and Foreman, so I'd be thrilled to be sitting here.  

ZWK said:

I would be pretty excited to trade you the pick. (My thoughts on Jones.)

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I actually did trade up in my rookie draft for Zay. Gave up 2.11 and 3.09 for 2.05. 

I before I go into my ramble I should state what I expect from Zay. I expect years 1 and 2 to be an emergency starter at my WR3. From year 3 on I expect a mid to low end WR2 but a really good WR3. This seems like a low ceiling but I think there is a very high likelihood of this happening. Just wanted to make sure we weren't discussing something different. 

The reason I like Jones so much is because of his catches. We can discount them in any way we want but his is still the "best" catcher to ever come out of college, based on his records in career and season catches. Even in the NFL scheme can still get guys targets but they just have to be able to catch it. Then you add in everything else. At the combine he did well. His age is fine, height is fine and his weight is 201. He could/should/will? put on some weight but it isn't like he is 175 or something. He did well in the Senior Bowl. He has a good bloodline and is considered a good character guy. 

I think he went to a good spot too. I'm bias though because I'm a Bills fan. However, Tyrod isn't a terrible QB and he isn't about to retire. Plus, he should have a clear shot to the WR2 role on that team. I'm not sure how much the offence will change under the new HC and GM but it would make sense that the Bills still have a strong run game and that Watkins draws the extra coverage. 

As a rebuttal to your formula, it seems like he gets dinged twice for the scheme he is in. Once, when you discount his reception production due to scheme. The second is when you factor in his YPT. But of the 2 factors, he has more influence on whether or not he makes a catch than he does on what plays and scheme is run. 

I concur with Bordens perspective on how Zay Jones may perform with the Bills for the most part. However if Watkins moves on to another team after this season, then I could see Jones opportunity spiking up to WR 2 status on volume.

I really like ZWKs work on college prospects. There are some good things about this. At the same time I also think his formulas put too much emphasis on big plays. Not that big plays aren't important, however it seems to me that big plays get double and perhaps even triple counted by a number of the stats being used. I think this ends up resulting in compounding errors of similar metrics.

Then you combine that with players with small sample size or targets, and those big plays get magnified even more.

Part of this may be source data that is being used as well. According to this site Jones only had 137 receptions in 12 games but this says he had 158 receptions in 12 games. I trust PFR data more than this other site, which I was only using for target data. There is enough inconsistency in this that I do question the accuracy of the data somewhat.

I have Bill Connely's target data for every year besides 2016 college season. I had to pro rate the targets for a missing game in 2014 but the results I get are this:

2014    SO 13 games    104 targets    81    830    10.2    5 TD
2015    JR 12 games    125 targets    98    1099    11.2    5 TD    
2016    SR 12 games    208 targets    158    1746    11.1    8 TD    

Last 3 years 37 games 437 targets 337 recpetions (77%) 3675 yards 10.9 ypr 8.4 YPT 18 TD 11.8 targets/game 9.1 receptions/game 99 yards/game .48 TD/game

Those are solid numbers. The only thing I would consider low here is the TDs.

Biabreakable said:

I concur with Bordens perspective on how Zay Jones may perform with the Bills for the most part. However if Watkins moves on to another team after this season, then I could see Jones opportunity spiking up to WR 2 status on volume.

I really like ZWKs work on college prospects. There are some good things about this. At the same time I also think his formulas put too much emphasis on big plays. Not that big plays aren't important, however it seems to me that big plays get double and perhaps even triple counted by a number of the stats being used. I think this ends up resulting in compounding errors of similar metrics.

Then you combine that with players with small sample size or targets, and those big plays get magnified even more.

Part of this may be source data that is being used as well. According to this site Jones only had 137 receptions in 12 games but this says he had 158 receptions in 12 games. I trust PFR data more than this other site, which I was only using for target data. There is enough inconsistency in this that I do question the accuracy of the data somewhat.

I have Bill Connely's target data for every year besides 2016 college season. I had to pro rate the targets for a missing game in 2014 but the results I get are this:

2014    SO 13 games    104 targets    81    830    10.2    5 TD
2015    JR 12 games    125 targets    98    1099    11.2    5 TD    
2016    SR 12 games    208 targets    158    1746    11.1    8 TD    

Last 3 years 37 games 437 targets 337 recpetions (77%) 3675 yards 10.9 ypr 8.4 YPT 18 TD 11.8 targets/game 9.1 receptions/game 99 yards/game .48 TD/game

Those are solid numbers. The only thing I would consider low here is the TDs.

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NCAASavant stopped updating partway through the season. (They have also had other issues in the past; when I have used them it has been as a source for catch rate data, which I combined with data on YPR from other sources to get YPT.) I am now getting my 2016 target data from Bill Connelly at Football Study Hall - he has Zay Jones at:

2016    SR 12 games    221 targets    158    1746    11.1    8 TD

That's 7.9 YPT, which is very low.

Different offensive systems help receivers in some of my stats and hurt them in other stats. If a receiver catches lots of short passes or WR screens then that increases his yardage total but hurts his YPT. If a team has other good receivers that should hurt a receiver's market share but help his YPT (because defenses can't focus entirely on him, and the QB doesn't have to force it to him). If a team is run heavy with one good receiver then that should help the receiver's market share but limit his totals. These don't all balance out perfectly, but they do at least partially offset each other.

I think the biggest remaining flaws are a tendency to overrate receivers on certain types of offenses, including receivers on elite offenses (like Baylor in its heyday), WR1s on extremely run-heavy teams (like Georgia Tech), and some relatively one-dimensional deep threats. But I do manage to catch many of these mistakes by incorporating data on size/athleticism. And they all involve overrating some players, rather than underrating players.

In general, successful NFL WRs typically show an ability to beat the defense for long receptions, red zone touchdowns, or big plays in the return game or running game. Catching short passes by finding the hole in the underneath zone is a nice skill to have, but a receiver as to do more than that to be a weapon in the NFL.

Thanks. I never found where Bill posted the data for 2016. This looks like a lot better resource and also consistent with the other data I have.

The difference is 13 more targets, so this drops Jones catch percentage by two and YPT by .2 using the most recent 3 year sample.

2014    SO 13 games    104 targets    81    830    10.2    5 TD
2015    JR 12 games    125 targets    98    1099    11.2    5 TD    
2016    SR 12 games    221 targets    158    1746    11.1    8 TD    

Last 3 years 37 games 450 targets 337 recpetions (75%) 3675 yards 10.9 ypr 8.2 YPT 18 TD

You say 7.9 YPT is very low, what is the average off all college WR in this category?

Biabreakable said:

Thanks. I never found where Bill posted the data for 2016. This looks like a lot better resource and also consistent with the other data I have.

The difference is 13 more targets, so this drops Jones catch percentage by two and YPT by .2 using the most recent 3 year sample.

2014    SO 13 games    104 targets    81    830    10.2    5 TD
2015    JR 12 games    125 targets    98    1099    11.2    5 TD    
2016    SR 12 games    221 targets    158    1746    11.1    8 TD    

Last 3 years 37 games 450 targets 337 recpetions (75%) 3675 yards 10.9 ypr 8.2 YPT 18 TD

You say 7.9 YPT is very low, what is the average off all college WR in this category?

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Average is around 9.4 YPT among the 100 players with the most receiving yards each season. This year Jones ranked 86th out of 100 in YPT among the 100 players with 743+ receiving yards.