Unproven players: are they overvalued?
Discussions about losing your league in the early rounds generally occur during discussions about players --- usually young players --- who have never proven that they are capable of the production their ADP implies. Obviously they have the potential or else their ADP wouldn't be that high, but they seem risky because they are not known quantities. I'm going to define a player to be "unproven" if his ADP is higher than his previous career best finish (fine print). This would obviously include all rookies. It includes players like Kevan Barlow in 2004 (ADP: RB12, best previous finish: RB17) and Kevin Jones last year --- these are the ones we remember well --- but don't forget that it also includes players like LaMont Jordan and Larry Fitzgerald from last year. This year's unproven players of interest include, but are not limited to, Ronnie Brown, Steven Jackson, Cadillac Williams, Reggie Bush, and Roy Williams.
So let's do an experiment. We'll look at the last six years of ADP data and do the following: we'll pretend that we are drafting from the ADP list and that, when our turn comes up, an uproven player is tops on the list. Then we'll scan down the list and look at the next-highest-ranked player who is not unproven. Then we'll see who did better (in terms of fantasy points per game) in that season.
For example, in 2000, the rookie Jamal Lewis had an ADP of RB18. The next running back on the ADP list was the venerable Ricky Watters, who was obviously not unproven. As it turned out, Watters would have been the better choice. He averaged 2.3 fantasy points per game more than Lewis did.
Here's how that will look in the data I'll present:
Name YR PrevHi ADP FPPG-------------------------------------------Jamal Lewis 2000 - 18 12.6Ricky Watters 3 19 15.0DIFF: -2.3But one example means very little. That's why we're collecting six year's worth. Also, because our question is somewhat subjective and our algorithm is rote, some examples might even seem a bit misleading. That's why I've included all the data right here. You can comb through it and focus on only the subset that seems most relevant to you.But the point is, if the market overvalues unproven players then we should be able to gain advantage, in the long run, by skipping over them and taking a lower ranked but presumably safer option. And if that's the case, then at least some evidence for it ought to show itself in this study.
Results: overall, there were 136 pairs. In 73 of them (53.6%), the unproven player outperformed the proven one. On average, the unproven player outperformed the proven one by 0.47 fantasy points per game. In the official sense, this is not anywhere near statistically significant evidence that unproven players are undervalued (especially since the comparison is slightly rigged in their favor), but that's not important. The important thing is that we see no evidence that unproven players are overvalued.
I have long believed that the fantasy football market is pretty efficient and this study is, in my view, more evidence in support of that view. There may be a few players each year who are incorrectly valued by the masses, but I have yet to find any identifiable group of players who are systematically over- or undervalued by the general fantasy football playing public.
I'll close with the positional breakdown:
Pos Number of Pairs Unproven was better Proven was better Avg Diff--------------------------------------------------------------------------------QB 28 20 8 +1.66RB 49 22 27 -0.10WR 37 19 18 +0.00TE 22 12 10 +1.02You might be tempted to infer from this that unproven quarterbacks are actually undervalued, but I'm not sure there is enough evidence here to conclude that. It's a pretty small sample. Still, it does at the least say that it's very unlikely that unproven quarterbacks are overvalued. If you like Philip Rivers, for instance, and are trying to build up your resolve to pull the trigger on him, this might help.Fine print
1. I excluded players who had previously achieved an elite level of production, even if it wasn't quite as high as their ADP. For example, LaDainian Tomlinson has never ranked higher than RB3, but even his ADP is RB2, no one would think of him as unproven.
3. I only included the top 20 QBs, the top 30 RBs, the top 30 WRs, and the top 15 TEs of each season.
2. All ADP data is taken from myfantasyleague redraft league drafts conducted after August 25th of the given season.
Exactly what I mean.
Discussion for another thread. Feel free to start it up though (or better yet do a search) - most who go to auctions strongly prefer it. I doubt that's coincedence.Anyway, I think in 12+ team leagues and near the end of the picks, going top WR w/2d tier RB is well worth considering, esp in PPR.
Discussion for another thread. Feel free to start it up though (or better yet do a search) - most who go to auctions strongly prefer it. I doubt that's coincedence.
Go get what we want, before anyone else does.
