How can we get more useful dynasty rankings? (1 Viewer)

[The Comedian]

I think, industry wide, there's a problem with how dynasty rankings are presented. In short, they're basically presented as redraft rankings with the word "Dynasty" on top. There's no context offered, no accounting for different dynasty team situations, no background given explaining where the ranking person is coming from. This works okay in redraft rankings (assuming you account for different scoring systems, league parameters, etc.), but in dynasty leagues, there are extra dimensions such as now vs. future, youth vs. reliability, players vs. draft picks, "win-now" vs. "rebuild," etc. Yet, we get the same, straightforward, sequential lists that are prepared for redraft leagues.

I don't know how we can make this better, but I do know that someone in the industry needs to think of a way to be more innovative, take things a step further. I understand that the vast majority of $ is in redraft leagues, so business angle their products towards that, but I don't think it would take a lot to provide a really unique way of looking at this topic because so many of the sites seem to stick to the status quo.

This is something I whipped up in about 20 minutes tonight:

My link

If you download it into an Excel file, there should be some filters up there. Basically all I did was have two sets of rankings/tiers - a "win now" list (which I called 2.5 Year Window because I couldn't think of whether "win now" meant 2 or 3 years) and then a "Rebuild" list, which is self-explanatory. You can use filters to sort/filter by whatever you're interested in looking at.

This is hardly a brilliant step, I know, but it's just an example of acknowledging that, unlike redraft teams, not all dynasty teams have exactly the same goal at a given time. I'm interested in starting a discussion (one that I know has been taking place in pieces in other threads) about what else could be done to make dynasty rankings a little more useful.

Oh and don't bother coming in here to criticize my rankings, lol. They were off the top of my head, and my ranking really isn't the point anyway.

 

[I was in the pool]

Yep. I agree on both points. Dynasty is not where the bread is buttered from a business angle (more niche of giant redraft market) and how rankings are presented could be improved.One thing to think about is that the average dynasty owner probably is more active and "in the know" than the average redraft player, so are external dynasty rankings as vital?

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

I took a stab at this recently and ranked guys within categories...Prime starters (3+ years left)Vet starters (0-2 years left)Top prospects (guys I thought might be elite)Other prospects (guys I thought might carve out a role)Unranked (guys I thought had no shot at a multi-year starting gig)Which players appear on each list, and how each person would integrate those lists is going to be different though.

 

[RavenLunatic]

Perhaps on FBG just have each ranker share a link to their dynasty philosophy and what is influencing their thinking. I also agree that rankings aren't really even necessary other than to establish ADP values for understanding market for a player. Of course that also varies by league rules and many don't contribute to IDP either. I personally only pay attention to the rankings of Bloom and Waldman because I've listened and read enough of their work to know what I agree with and where opinions differ. I mainly look at ratings to see where someone has a specific player I am thinking about at the moment. Look for anomaly and consider new players to research.

 

[Bronx Bomber]

PFF just put out a 3 article series explaining the rationale behind their rankings if you are a member. I only skimmed it but you stat/math guys would probably be able to get more out of it than me. I agree with RL above. We should all know Waldman and Blooms philosophy or style by now. I'm sure if anyone has any questions about specific rankers they would probably answer on Twitter as that's how everything is going now. I like the effort above though. Normally I just bump guys up or down in my head or in my own ranking based on my style or team make-up but separate lists for each category is nice and the Excel sheet makes it easy to look at with the color coded tiers. Nice job

 

[Warhogs]

I believe I had come across sometyhing a couple of years back where somebody had done their rankings but also included projected points out several years. I would think that would be more helpful for someone wanting to be able to look either long term or short term. I don't remember where I came across them but like the concept.

 

[Concept Coop]

Projected career value or career VBD: Points/year x years left, divided by baseline points/year x years left.But really, it isn't possible to provide perfect rankings because we are all looking for different things. I like "vacuum" based rankings and feel just fine adjusting them mentally to fit my teams needs. I don't feel like I need someone to spell out that Frank Gore isn't worth more to me than Bernard Pierce if I am rebuilding.But, again, that is just me. Some people like to look 3 year out, or 4, or 5+. Different strokes.

 

[jeter23]

I agree there is an industry wide issue and it's all about context. There are multiple strategies that can be effective in dynasty leagues and it is often hard to tell where rankers are coming from.At DLF, we are currently revamping our rankings and I think they will be much more user friendly, including some of the suggestions mentioned here.

 

[jonboltz]

I agree there is an industry wide issue and it's all about context. There are multiple strategies that can be effective in dynasty leagues and it is often hard to tell where rankers are coming from.At DLF, we are currently revamping our rankings and I think they will be much more user friendly, including some of the suggestions mentioned here.

Love your site, and your rankings are getting better. Would really love if you had the feature, like they have here, where you can remove a ranker from the list.

 

[Concept Coop]

At DLF, we are currently revamping our rankings and I think they will be much more user friendly, including some of the suggestions mentioned here.

You guys are really setting the dynasty standard at DLF. When I first found it - maybe 3-4 years ago - it wasn't anywhere close to what it is today. I will likely be investing in a membership.

 

[MAC_32]

I think rankings for dyno are almost useless except in start ups. Too much depends on the current makeup of your team.

 

[Concept Coop]

I think rankings for dyno are almost useless except in start ups. Too much depends on the current makeup of your team.

I wouldn't say that. I really enjoy having a 2nd (3rd,4th...) opinion - at any point during the year. I can't watch anywhere close to every game, so many players won't get the attention from me that would lead to a solid ranking. When potential deals come up involving said players, again, I look at how others value him.

 

[MAC_32]

I think rankings for dyno are almost useless except in start ups. Too much depends on the current makeup of your team.

I wouldn't say that. I really enjoy having a 2nd (3rd,4th...) opinion - at any point during the year. I can't watch anywhere close to every game, so many players won't get the attention from me that would lead to a solid ranking. When potential deals come up involving said players, again, I look at how others value him.

Is lamichael james a top 30 rb or top 50? Depends on the rest of your roster. I have him in two dynos. One also has Richardson, Ryan Williams, Ingram, knowshon, and ben tate. I am holding there. The other has Richardson and Reggie Bush. That's it. Traded j stew away last year and I don't plan to keep Benson and Felix. I will consider moving lmj if it can help my lineup right now. It's all relative to the roster.

 

[Concept Coop]

Is lamichael james a top 30 rb or top 50? Depends on the rest of your roster. I have him in two dynos. One also has Richardson, Ryan Williams, Ingram, knowshon, and ben tate. I am holding there. The other has Richardson and Reggie Bush. That's it. Traded j stew away last year and I don't plan to keep Benson and Felix. I will consider moving lmj if it can help my lineup right now. It's all relative to the roster.

Of course; there are plenty of scenarios in which our roster and goals will affect how we value rankings. But I use them all the time, if for nothing more than another opinion. Is James worth more than Turbin? Pierce? Hillman? Richardson? Those are questions that rankings can help us answer; even if it doesn't tell us how valuable he is compared to Gore, as that would greatly depend on our roster/goals.

 

[SSOG]

I think rankings for dyno are almost useless except in start ups. Too much depends on the current makeup of your team.

I wouldn't say that. I really enjoy having a 2nd (3rd,4th...) opinion - at any point during the year. I can't watch anywhere close to every game, so many players won't get the attention from me that would lead to a solid ranking. When potential deals come up involving said players, again, I look at how others value him.

Is lamichael james a top 30 rb or top 50? Depends on the rest of your roster. I have him in two dynos. One also has Richardson, Ryan Williams, Ingram, knowshon, and ben tate. I am holding there. The other has Richardson and Reggie Bush. That's it. Traded j stew away last year and I don't plan to keep Benson and Felix. I will consider moving lmj if it can help my lineup right now. It's all relative to the roster.

How is this different from redraft? Should you trade Dez Bryant for Alfred Morris? If your other WRs are Calvin, Demaryius, and Cruz, while you're starting Mikel LeShoure at RB, the go for it. If your other RBs are Peterson, Rice, and Charles, while you're starting Josh Morgan at WR, then you should probably pass. Also, while we're at it, what is your scoring system and roster requirements? Are you trading to a top competitor or a doormat? How many bench spots do you have and what does the wire look like?I'm all for making rankings clearer, more useful, more broadly applicable, and more precise, but there's always going to be a limit on how much hand-holding one can do. At some point, every owner needs to realize that nothing in the hobby can ever be truly universal and that they're going to start making mental adjustments. Or, if they're unwilling, that's what twitter and mailbags are for.

 

[MAC_32]

Is lamichael james a top 30 rb or top 50? Depends on the rest of your roster. I have him in two dynos. One also has Richardson, Ryan Williams, Ingram, knowshon, and ben tate. I am holding there. The other has Richardson and Reggie Bush. That's it. Traded j stew away last year and I don't plan to keep Benson and Felix. I will consider moving lmj if it can help my lineup right now. It's all relative to the roster.

Of course; there are plenty of scenarios in which our roster and goals will affect how we value rankings. But I use them all the time, if for nothing more than another opinion. Is James worth more than Turbin? Pierce? Hillman? Richardson? Those are questions that rankings can help us answer; even if it doesn't tell us how valuable he is compared to Gore, as that would greatly depend on our roster/goals.

If I own marshawn, rice, or knowshon i would rather have their backup than lmj. Again, all relative.

 

[MAC_32]

I think rankings for dyno are almost useless except in start ups. Too much depends on the current makeup of your team.

I wouldn't say that. I really enjoy having a 2nd (3rd,4th...) opinion - at any point during the year. I can't watch anywhere close to every game, so many players won't get the attention from me that would lead to a solid ranking. When potential deals come up involving said players, again, I look at how others value him.

Is lamichael james a top 30 rb or top 50? Depends on the rest of your roster. I have him in two dynos. One also has Richardson, Ryan Williams, Ingram, knowshon, and ben tate. I am holding there. The other has Richardson and Reggie Bush. That's it. Traded j stew away last year and I don't plan to keep Benson and Felix. I will consider moving lmj if it can help my lineup right now. It's all relative to the roster.

How is this different from redraft? Should you trade Dez Bryant for Alfred Morris? If your other WRs are Calvin, Demaryius, and Cruz, while you're starting Mikel LeShoure at RB, the go for it. If your other RBs are Peterson, Rice, and Charles, while you're starting Josh Morgan at WR, then you should probably pass. Also, while we're at it, what is your scoring system and roster requirements? Are you trading to a top competitor or a doormat? How many bench spots do you have and what does the wire look like?I'm all for making rankings clearer, more useful, more broadly applicable, and more precise, but there's always going to be a limit on how much hand-holding one can do. At some point, every owner needs to realize that nothing in the hobby can ever be truly universal and that they're going to start making mental adjustments. Or, if they're unwilling, that's what twitter and mailbags are for.

Rankings are most useful draft day. Yearly leagues draft once per year, dynasty only drafts once.

 

[EBF]

I took a stab at this recently and ranked guys within categories...Prime starters (3+ years left)Vet starters (0-2 years left)Top prospects (guys I thought might be elite)Other prospects (guys I thought might carve out a role)Unranked (guys I thought had no shot at a multi-year starting gig)Which players appear on each list, and how each person would integrate those lists is going to be different though.

When I first set out to make rankings this past year, I did something similar.With redraft rankings, you only have to think about this season. With dynasty rankings, one team might be playing for this season and another might be looking 2-3 years down the line. That completely skews how those teams are going to value players like Andre Johnson and Michael Floyd. When you try to account for that in one single list of players, it gets ugly.

 

[Concept Coop]

If I own marshawn, rice, or knowshon i would rather have their backup than lmj. Again, all relative.

Right, but what if you don't? What if you don't feel comfortable making the call between Hilton and Shorts? Or Eli and Romo? If you don't use them, that is fine. But plenty, including myself, find them usefull year round.

 

[Holy Schneikes]

You can't make adjustments with respect to a baseline if you don't know what that baseline is. I agree with many, that rankers in general need to tell us what they are thinking about when ranking.Yes, situation makes a HUGE impact to the value of a player to a team. But as much as possible, generic evaluators need to be generic in their assumptions. Tell us the scoring system (like most decent redraft rankings usually do), tell us you assume an an average contending team with an average age composition, and go from there. As others have said, I think the best bet is to base an evaluation on a dynasty startup. And if you provide an "overall" multi-position ranking, a general sense of starting requirements is pretty important too.Too many folks doing these rankings bring in a lot of bias to their rankings - not PLAYER bias, but situational/league bias. So if they play in a lot of leagues where they have very good contending teams on the older side, veteran players with nice short-term upside are going to have more value to them than young flyers. Conversely, guys who are coming from the viewpoint of a team built for the future, have little interest in a 34 year old WR, even if that WR had a great year last year.There is a situation in current FBGs dynasty rankings where a 31 YO high end receiver is ranked 6 slots over a 24 YO receiver coming off of a season that bested anything the 31 year has put up in his career (and which followed another very good season the year prior which was pretty close to the best the 31 YO ever put up). The ONLY way I can think of to explain that would be if the guy doing the rankings either doesn't know what he is doing at all, OR he is looking STRICTLY at the the next couple of years and thinks the 31 YO might be slightly better over those next couple of years. I prefer to assume the latter, but if that IS the case, it is something that should be mentioned up front with the rankings.So going forward, the suggestion would be to for that ranker to re-evaluate his rankings relative to the baseline everyone else is using, or just put those rankings in some separate list somewhere.

 

[buck naked]

I agree there is an industry wide issue and it's all about context. There are multiple strategies that can be effective in dynasty leagues and it is often hard to tell where rankers are coming from.At DLF, we are currently revamping our rankings and I think they will be much more user friendly, including some of the suggestions mentioned here.

Not everybody is in the know. What is DLF?

 

[Concept Coop]

I agree there is an industry wide issue and it's all about context. There are multiple strategies that can be effective in dynasty leagues and it is often hard to tell where rankers are coming from.At DLF, we are currently revamping our rankings and I think they will be much more user friendly, including some of the suggestions mentioned here.

Not everybody is in the know. What is DLF?

dynastyleaguefootball.com

 

[Donsmith753]

What you really need is a ranking system whereby you input your current roster. It looks up those players in the rankings and checks how they're ranked in a more general sense. It then takes into account the age and current ranking of your players and adjusts the general ranking set for your conditions.I realise I'm not explaining this well so I might try and pull together an example if that's something there'd be interest in.

 

[Kleck]

Dynasty Rankings = Politics and Religion

Too many variables, and owners with different philosophies, strategies and opinions. I really only look at them to gauge how others may view a player for trade value purposes. I'll tier guys out like wdcrob posted above, but how I use those tiers will vary depending on each of my leagues since I tend to focus more on an overall team balance of age, production and potential.

 

[ghostguy123]

Do what I do, make your own. You can use some startup drafts as a guide. Maybe also take the rankings from a few different places and put an average ranking for each guy. The move guys up or down. Make a tier system also, might make it easier. It's also quite important to know the exact details of the intended league when someone is making rankings, such as the lineup requirements, size of rosters, is there a taxi squad, scoring system................rankings can be very different just based on this alone. Then you have to know if they are ranking the guys for a 1-2 year window, a 3 year window, 5 year window, 10 year window...............The biggest problem with rankings though is that they change EVERY DAY!!!! Even the people who make the ranking would make them differently if you ask them to do it again a couple days later.

 

[32 Counter Pass]

Dynasty Rankings = Politics and Religion

Well said. I always get a kick out of the guys that pretend to know what a player's situation is going to be 3 years down the road. Fitz is a classic example of the ridiculousness of this thinking. Rewind 3 years ago and every ranking had him as a top 10 WR. In reality his situation changed so dramatically for the worse over the past couple of years that he wasn't even starting option the last 8 games this year. Just makes me every time I see someone suggest this.

 

[mental]

Dynasty Rankings = Politics and Religion

This may be the way they work now, but it doesn't have to be that way. Dynasty rankings should be about valuing assets at your personal discount rate. VBD production is like a bond; how you value a dynasty asset depends on what your outlook is, but having an estimate of return probabilities is still important to pricing the asset. The beauty of dynasty leagues is that trades can get both teams much closer to their goals. Do you want to win this year, or are rosters so limited that you can reload with free agents at a moment's notice? Short-term production is at a premium for you, your future is now. Look at redraft rankings and get (old) guys that improve you this year; sell Tannehill and Ben Tate for Drew Brees if you can, and throw in a 2013 pick if you have to. Are you willing to trade competing in 2013 and 2014 for a shot at an extended run of dominance once you get your Tajh Boyd-TJ Yeldon package on line? Then by all means, give Andre Johnson for Justin Blackmon and Peyton Manning for Kyle Rudolph and a 2015 1st rounder. No dynasty ranking can know these facts about your situation.Kendall Hunter vs. Frank Gore is a great litmus test this year -- Gore is without question more valuable in a startup if you have any championship aspirations in 2013, but would you trade that for the hopefully-near-replacement-with-huge-upside-for-multiple-years production Hunter offers? Depends entirely on your estimate of Hunter's future production (will he stay healthy? what role will James have?), but that's what most dynasty rankings ignore when they put Gore at "#22" and Hunter at "#24" and leave it at that (Marshall Faulk vs. Steven Jackson and Priest Holmes vs. Larry Johnson were litmaus tests in past years). We all know VBD is harder to predict in 2016 than in 2013, but risk tolerance -- because of situation, disposition, or both -- is different from owner to owner. Good dynasty rankings will eventually acknowledge they know nothing about your goals and just give their ideas about the balance sheet of short- vs. long- term production for each player relative to his position. Until then, reading dynasty rankings will be like watching "Mad Money" on CNBC. Caveat emptor.

 

[Holy Schneikes]

Dynasty Rankings = Politics and Religion

Well said. I always get a kick out of the guys that pretend to know what a player's situation is going to be 3 years down the road. Fitz is a classic example of the ridiculousness of this thinking. Rewind 3 years ago and every ranking had him as a top 10 WR. In reality his situation changed so dramatically for the worse over the past couple of years that he wasn't even starting option the last 8 games this year. Just makes me every time I see someone suggest this.

Just like in the rest of life, some aspects are predictable and some aren't. Age is actually one of the EASIER things to factor in. Not that a decline always follows the same path, far from it. But I can damn near guarantee Randy Moss will not be producing significant fantasy points three years from now - and he was one of the best receivers in NFL history.When a guy is 31, there are no real guarantees for three years out. But even at that point the odds are VERY strong that a guy will not be producing stud numbers at 34. Looking at the top 50 or so receivers from last year, Wayne is the only guy I see over 32.So yeah, looking past three years IS relevant to say the least. A guy's situation may become horrible over three years, but that is VERY hard to predict. Predicting a tail off around age 31/32/33 is NOT hard to predict. So to just totally ignore a large age difference in a league where you can keep a guy FOREVER makes no sense to me.Roddy White is still a fantastic receiver. He MIGHT be in the same ballpark as a guy like Dez Bryant for the next year or two. But in three years if not sooner, he will in all likelihood be worthless. Bryant will be 27 in three years. The difference in value there is HUGE. Sure, Bryant could do something dumb, he could get injured, or any number of other negative scenarios could play out, we don't know. But even if the odds of all that stuff add up to only a 50% chance he's valuable after three years, it's a heck of a lot better than White's 2% chance.

 

[Donsmith753]

What you really need is a ranking system whereby you input your current roster. It looks up those players in the rankings and checks how they're ranked in a more general sense. It then takes into account the age and current ranking of your players and adjusts the general ranking set for your conditions.I realise I'm not explaining this well so I might try and pull together an example if that's something there'd be interest in.

I've roughly put something together, the only bit I haven't yet worked out is how to adjust for age and ranking. Once I have an idea of how to do that I can have it take your inputs and discount players in the ranking based upon your current team strengths/weaknesses and age.Would appreciate any thoughts on this and if it's something you'd want to see in more detail.**One bit that isn't working in google docs is the graphs. In my excel version I have Age and Rank distribution graphs as well**https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ar_3IVXZG6mJdDdQVGFsdmwwbGR4S3B4MkhidVUxdGc&usp=sharing

 

[The Comedian]

I agree that dynasty rankings can't be tailored to the point where it fits a single owner's league settings, team quality, age, etc. But right now they're not tailored for ANYTHING, and I think we can at least do better than that.

 

[Tornacl]

I generally agree with those that say dynasty rankings are of minimum value, in the sense that if you're playing dynasty leagues and you need someone else to tell you who you should be going after, then you're not going to be very successful. You should have your own rankings/opinions on players.However, dynasty rankings are good as a starting point in trade negotiations. I wish more people would use them - too often people project their own bias into player values, and expect the other owner to agree with their values. And we all see how this works out - teams value their own players at their highest possible potential, and value players on other teams based on their worst output. The value in having dynasty rankings is that teams can get a reasonable idea of what players are worth - it doesn't mean that you have to agree with the rankings. The trick is to find players that you feel are over or under-valued. If you're playing in a competitive league, you're never going to get someone to trade you Trent Richardson for Frank Gore at this point, but you can look at rankings and find players that you think are ranked way to low, and acquire them at their current market value - then have them far out-produce that value. The teams that can consistently do that are the teams that build the real dynasties.

 

[Biabreakable]

Dynasty Rankings = Politics and Religion

Well said. I always get a kick out of the guys that pretend to know what a player's situation is going to be 3 years down the road. Fitz is a classic example of the ridiculousness of this thinking. Rewind 3 years ago and every ranking had him as a top 10 WR. In reality his situation changed so dramatically for the worse over the past couple of years that he wasn't even starting option the last 8 games this year. Just makes me every time I see someone suggest this.

Well glad to keep you amused.It is far from a perfected science making projections. However there are some things that remain consistent such as an offense performing well should have over 1000 offensive plays. It was somewhat interesting early last season that the Patriots were on pace to possibly break the record for number of offensive plays run in a season. The Patriots ended up with 1191 total plays on offense which is a high mark with the average being somewhere around 1000. So while injuries and things like that will change ones expectations a lot, you do still have a framework of the number of expected plays the team will run, how effective that will be based on past performance and some general ideas about the distribution of those plays.Now this does narrow things down into a somewhat predictable range of outcomes that you base your projection on. The problem with projecting further than the current season is somewhat the same as it would be right now. We do not know where certain players will be playing yet until after free agency, we also do not know what players teams will get in the draft and how that will impact their performance, as well as the performance of other players on their team. So projecting what players will be doing in the 2014 are going to have as many flaws as a ranking for players does now, before free agency and the draft and it will have another free agency/rookie cycle on top of that which will change expectations and therefore projections.But what else are you going to do if you want to know how much Trent Richardson might score compared to Doug Martin in 2014 or 2015?For the most part I just carry the 2013 projection over the 2 years and discount the following years in part because of the uncertainty. If a player hits an age cutoff like HS was talking about then I discount the player for that as well. Some players like young WR I may have projected to perform better in following seasons than I expect in 2013 as I expect it take time for them to develop and earn that role in the offense. Of course a draft or free agency move could totally change that outlook. But some idea to me is better than none.

 

[wiscstlatlmia]

I understand what most of you are saying, but I don't think having one set of rankings is an issue, especially if you throw out the ' I gotta get these right for every team' idea. I believe there is a definite 'self conscience' value to each player at a certain time. certainly your personal value shifts if your in 'win now' or 'rebuild' mode, but that is you changing, not what the actual situation is . Just because I'm trying to win this year doesn't make me think Tom Brady is worth more than Andrew Luck, but I may make a lopsided trade with Brady and Luck involved because I've shifted the goal to more of a redraft ideal. I know most are in the opinion of ranking's not representing trade value, and to some extent I agree. It shouldn't be representing the latest ADP, but it should be representing your fantasy football 'self conscience', or at least that's how I think about it. I would never rank a player above another that I wouldn't trade for straight up. I know that has brought up a lot of debate lately and while I highly respect the opinions bringing this topic up, I don't understand it. If I really, really like a player... what is holding me back from trading the house for him? It's the main reason why I started that buy low thread. I was fighting myself to make trades for guys that I wanted because I didn't think I was getting proper 'value' from ADPs and other's rankings... but in my personal ranking, the trades were even, if I had just followed my personal list I would be farther ahead of the game. From day 1 I have based my rankings off of what I truly think about the player and I rank them accordingly. While sometimes it may make you look crazy compared to the common ranking, being ahead of the game AND ACTING ON IT is what sets you apart in the long run. I don't really have a guy I'm going out on a crazy limb for now, but putting CJ Spiller in the top 10 a few years ago is a prime example... If I have him at #10 and most have him in the 30s ... great news, but if I have him at #10 that means I should be willing to trade players 30-11 to get him , even if the market tells me I'm getting hosed. Most likely I wouldn't have to, but the point is, my fantasy conscience would lead me to believe I was lying about that ranking if I would reject any of those situations. Obviously I'm not taking the team bias concept into account for that example, but the point of having rankings is to reflect what your broad scope of the fantasy landscape is, right? I actually tested this out... I was pimping Darren McFadden really hard the past few years and had him as a top 5 back... well, I made trades and before I accepted I said to myself "if you really believe in your own hype machine and think hes that great of a back, you do this trade" so I did in multiple leagues... I also did this with Jermichael Finley... LOL as you can see, my hype machine was off big time... but I went with what I believed at the time and it taught me a lot and shifted my ideas on future players. (like to never trust injury prone RBs named Darren McFadden who play for the Raiders)If I have guys ranked highly but I'm not willing to trade that much to get them, do I really believe my own stuff? What validity do I have if I don't believe my own beliefs?!?!? ahhhhhh lolmoral of the story........I suppose you could break it down into separate 'win now' and 'rebuild' sections, but I feel there is a 'self conscience' bell in your brain that rings off every time you send and receive a trade offer.

 

[JPeso]

I've always been perturbed by dynasty rankings that rank based on the market and not what they would actually apply in a league setting. When I dropped external rankings I knew I would trade by them as I didn't feel comfortable providing rankings to people and not stepping up to the plate when I got an offer based on my rankings.Listen, I get that situations can be different, but rankings are not helpful unless they are pointing out what is wrong with the market. I shouldn't have to put guys lower than I like them because of the market, or else my lower ranking of a player I like is not helpful to anyone. I can get the market's valuation by looking at drafts and trades if I want. Rankings should be that person's valuation, not the market's valuation. Until you have guys who have consistently gotten calls right, and are willing to rank based on their calls as opposed to the market, rankings are relatively useless.

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

Until you have guys who have consistently gotten calls right, and are willing to rank based on their calls as opposed to the market, rankings are relatively useless.

I would be very curious to know how many dynasty leagues the FBG rankers actually play in, and how they fared.What makes FBGs great for redraft is that Dodds has a track record of doing well when the money is on the line, and he gives you the same tools he uses. I'm not convinced FBG staffers have the same sort of track record in dynasty and I think it shows up in the rankings.

 

[Dragon1952]

Dynasty Rankings = Politics and Religion

Too many variables, and owners with different philosophies, strategies and opinions. I really only look at them to gauge how others may view a player for trade value purposes. I'll tier guys out like wdcrob posted above, but how I use those tiers will vary depending on each of my leagues since I tend to focus more on an overall team balance of age, production and potential.

Exactly. It seems the issue most have when they complain about someone else's rankings is that they don't conform closely enough to their own, which doesn't make much sense. It's like they are just looking for confirmation of what they already believe, and if they don't find it the reaction is to be upset or confused. I mean, if you already have enough experience in the hobby to develop a credible set of rankings you don't really need a lot of help. I guess it just makes us feel good when someone else agrees. After all, aren't redraft and dynasty rankings more for beginners and/or those of us without enough time or experience to 'know' for themselves? At best they are just a rough guide for those in the know anyway. When I see a player ranking that I believe to be way out of whack I just assume that maybe I know more than the ranker. Maybe some of us don't give ourselves enough credit and think that just because someone else's rankings are published they must be more knowledgable than us? I agree it is helpful to get expert opinion on the guys that haven't broken out yet, but if we're talking about established players I think we all have a pretty good idea of when someone else's ranking of a certain player is questionable.Having said that...yeah, I agree the current state of rankings are not very helpful and would at least love to see a sentence or 2 of explanation next to each ranking, except for the obvious ones anyway.

EDIT: I like the way Bloom adds the occasional comment on his weekly in-season projections.

 

[Concept Coop]

Until you have guys who have consistently gotten calls right, and are willing to rank based on their calls as opposed to the market, rankings are relatively useless.

Who would that be for you?I used to follow SSOG, and still pay attention to his old site, even though he's not doing the rankings anymore. Chris Wesseling is as good as it gets, if you play in non-PPR leagues. FBG has guys I follow and a few I don't put much stock in.I listen to guys here in the SP, and pay attention when they post rankings here.

 

[Concept Coop]

I'm not convinced FBG staffers have the same sort of track record in dynasty and I think it shows up in the rankings.

Can only speak for Tef and Hammond, but they among the best dynasty owners around.

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

I'm not convinced FBG staffers have the same sort of track record in dynasty and I think it shows up in the rankings.

Can only speak for Tef and Hammond, but they among the best dynasty owners around.

I agree.

 

[32 Counter Pass]

Dynasty Rankings = Politics and Religion

Well said. I always get a kick out of the guys that pretend to know what a player's situation is going to be 3 years down the road. Fitz is a classic example of the ridiculousness of this thinking. Rewind 3 years ago and every ranking had him as a top 10 WR. In reality his situation changed so dramatically for the worse over the past couple of years that he wasn't even starting option the last 8 games this year. Just makes me every time I see someone suggest this.

Well glad to keep you amused.It is far from a perfected science making projections. However there are some things that remain consistent such as an offense performing well should have over 1000 offensive plays. It was somewhat interesting early last season that the Patriots were on pace to possibly break the record for number of offensive plays run in a season. The Patriots ended up with 1191 total plays on offense which is a high mark with the average being somewhere around 1000. So while injuries and things like that will change ones expectations a lot, you do still have a framework of the number of expected plays the team will run, how effective that will be based on past performance and some general ideas about the distribution of those plays.Now this does narrow things down into a somewhat predictable range of outcomes that you base your projection on. The problem with projecting further than the current season is somewhat the same as it would be right now. We do not know where certain players will be playing yet until after free agency, we also do not know what players teams will get in the draft and how that will impact their performance, as well as the performance of other players on their team. So projecting what players will be doing in the 2014 are going to have as many flaws as a ranking for players does now, before free agency and the draft and it will have another free agency/rookie cycle on top of that which will change expectations and therefore projections.But what else are you going to do if you want to know how much Trent Richardson might score compared to Doug Martin in 2014 or 2015?For the most part I just carry the 2013 projection over the 2 years and discount the following years in part because of the uncertainty. If a player hits an age cutoff like HS was talking about then I discount the player for that as well. Some players like young WR I may have projected to perform better in following seasons than I expect in 2013 as I expect it take time for them to develop and earn that role in the offense. Of course a draft or free agency move could totally change that outlook. But some idea to me is better than none.

I think two years is fine, anymore than that is just silly to me.

 

[Biabreakable]

Not what I was looking for but an interesting thread.

 

[EBF]

I've always been perturbed by dynasty rankings that rank based on the market and not what they would actually apply in a league setting. When I dropped external rankings I knew I would trade by them as I didn't feel comfortable providing rankings to people and not stepping up to the plate when I got an offer based on my rankings.Listen, I get that situations can be different, but rankings are not helpful unless they are pointing out what is wrong with the market. I shouldn't have to put guys lower than I like them because of the market, or else my lower ranking of a player I like is not helpful to anyone. I can get the market's valuation by looking at drafts and trades if I want. Rankings should be that person's valuation, not the market's valuation. Until you have guys who have consistently gotten calls right, and are willing to rank based on their calls as opposed to the market, rankings are relatively useless.

Completely agree with this.

Consensus dynasty rankings are completely useless apart from providing an expectation for what ADP and market value will be like in your league. You are never going to gain an edge with consensus dynasty rankings because all they do is provide you with the community's average thinking. If you are using average opinions to drive your decisions then how can you expect to achieve above average results? I think it only works in soft leagues where several owners are clueless and/or very mistake-prone. I play in one or two leagues like that where a simple ABC approach will likely be enough to get you into playoff contention. By and large though, using community rankings as your guide is going to be a roadmap to mediocre performance. In a difficult league, you need to go above and beyond to have any significant success. To me that means finding flaws in the average rankings and exploiting those to your benefit.

You can try to do that on your own, you can use FF sites for opinions, and/or you can identify a handful of trusted expert sources and use them for ideas. What you CAN'T expect to do is go to a site like FBG and DLF and gain any significant wisdom from staff rankings that incorporate 8+ opinions into one list. Too many cooks spoil the broth. If someone on the staff has a real opinion -- for example, if someone thinks Carlos Hyde is a top 5 dynasty RB -- that ranking is going to get lost in the noise when you're using a democracy. Having said that, at least sites like FBG and DLF give you the ability to "uncheck" some of the staffers if you just want opinions from 1-2 people. I think looking at 1-2 trusted opinions is more valuable than looking at a huge glob of opinions from sources of varying merit. Outlier rankings are more interesting and valuable to me. At least they make you think.

Most of the work that I do for myself is focused on finding mistakes in the community's thinking, as it seems to me that identifying and exploiting these mistakes is maybe the only way to gain a consistent edge apart from basic things like knowing your format. Ranking players in the most obvious ABC order possible is a good way to protect your reputation, but it doesn't really provide your audience with actionable information. What I try to do (not always very successfully mind you), is to at least provide some opinions in certain cases that go outside what you're going to get from a list assembled by a committee of 12 guys with completely various tastes and preferences that coalesce into one big bland blob of nothing.

 

[Apathetic]

You are never going to gain an edge with consensus dynasty rankings because all they do is provide you with the community's average thinking. If you are using average opinions to drive your decisions then how can you expect to achieve above average results?

"If one asks a large enough number of people to guess the number of jelly beans in a jar, the averaged answer is likely to be very close to the correct number. True, occasionally someone may guess closer to the true number. But as you repeat the experiment, the same person never is better every time - the crowd is smarter than any individual. This finding is counterintuitive.

‘Collective wisdom’ is put to good use to tackle three kinds of problems, and complexity is no bar:

Cognition problems: such problems arise when we can only guess the answer – as e.g. about the contents of the jelly bean jar, or about the future. How do we get the guess right?

..."

http://www.diplomacy.edu/resources/books/reviews/wisdom-crowds-why-many-are-smarter-few

 

[Slapdash]

Chad Parson has some interesting rankings out there...

 

[EBF]

You are never going to gain an edge with consensus dynasty rankings because all they do is provide you with the community's average thinking. If you are using average opinions to drive your decisions then how can you expect to achieve above average results?

"If one asks a large enough number of people to guess the number of jelly beans in a jar, the averaged answer is likely to be very close to the correct number. True, occasionally someone may guess closer to the true number. But as you repeat the experiment, the same person never is better every time - the crowd is smarter than any individual. This finding is counterintuitive.

‘Collective wisdom’ is put to good use to tackle three kinds of problems, and complexity is no bar:

Cognition problems: such problems arise when we can only guess the answer – as e.g. about the contents of the jelly bean jar, or about the future. How do we get the guess right?

..."

http://www.diplomacy.edu/resources/books/reviews/wisdom-crowds-why-many-are-smarter-few

I'm not sure FF is parallel with counting jelly beans. In most competitive pursuits, there are people who consistently do better than others. It's not a roulette wheel. Make better decisions than the average person and you should net above average results. That applies whether you're talking about playing chess, poker, Magic, Monopoly, Candy Crush, or tic-tac-toe. They're all games that reward correctly assessing problems and making the best decision possible with each new scenario that's presented to you. The wisdom of the crowds isn't going to see you playing chess like Bobby Fischer or poker like Phil Ivey. It's going to see you as a break-even weekend hobbyist. Likewise, following consensus FF rankings verbatim will have the same result.

Having said that, it does relate to another point that I wanted to raise in my first post. I think when people set out to make dynasty rankings, the standard practice is to rank every single relevant player. I'm not sure that's really the best approach. I'm doing a startup draft right now and my cheatsheet only has 30-40 names to cover the entire draft. This is the way I've done things for years. The idea behind it is that you don't need to accurately peg the value of every single player in order to be successful so long as you're usually right with the small subset of players that you actually draft/trade/waiver. In other words, it doesn't matter too much what the other 11 first round rookie picks in your league do so long as the guy you take is worth more than the pick you spent on him. You need to have some understanding of what's out there in order to put his value in context and of course the more knowledge you have the better, but if you had a "Biff's Almanac" (Back to the Future 2) for even just 20% of the players in the NFL and then you just practiced average thinking for the other 80%, you'd probably accrue a nice edge.

That kind of captures the essence of my personal style, which is to focus most of my roster moves on high-certainty propositions and then defer to the wisdom of the crowd when it comes to players about whom I have no strong negative or positive feeling. In poker terms, play ABC the overwhelming majority of the time, except for those rare spots where you know with high certainty that you can make an unexpected move to win a little value. It's not quite "ideal" strategy (ideal would be making the perfect move in every single situation -- simply not realistic), but if you do that well then you'll probably build a strong team since you're not racing the cheetah, you're just racing the other guys in your league.

 

[Adam Harstad]

You are never going to gain an edge with consensus dynasty rankings because all they do is provide you with the community's average thinking. If you are using average opinions to drive your decisions then how can you expect to achieve above average results?

"If one asks a large enough number of people to guess the number of jelly beans in a jar, the averaged answer is likely to be very close to the correct number. True, occasionally someone may guess closer to the true number. But as you repeat the experiment, the same person never is better every time - the crowd is smarter than any individual. This finding is counterintuitive.

‘Collective wisdom’ is put to good use to tackle three kinds of problems, and complexity is no bar:

Cognition problems: such problems arise when we can only guess the answer – as e.g. about the contents of the jelly bean jar, or about the future. How do we get the guess right?

..."

http://www.diplomacy.edu/resources/books/reviews/wisdom-crowds-why-many-are-smarter-few

I'm not sure FF is parallel with counting jelly beans. In most competitive pursuits, there are people who consistently do better than others. It's not a roulette wheel. Make better decisions than the average person and you should net above average results. That applies whether you're talking about playing chess, poker, Magic, Monopoly, Candy Crush, or tic-tac-toe. They're all games that reward correctly assessing problems and making the best decision possible with each new scenario that's presented to you. The wisdom of the crowds isn't going to see you playing chess like Bobby Fischer or poker like Phil Ivey. It's going to see you as a break-even weekend hobbyist. Likewise, following consensus FF rankings verbatim will have the same result.

Having said that, it does relate to another point that I wanted to raise in my first post. I think when people set out to make dynasty rankings, the standard practice is to rank every single relevant player. I'm not sure that's really the best approach. I'm doing a startup draft right now and my cheatsheet only has 30-40 names to cover the entire draft. This is the way I've done things for years. The idea behind it is that you don't need to accurately peg the value of every single player in order to be successful so long as you're usually right with the small subset of players that you actually draft/trade/waiver. In other words, it doesn't matter too much what the other 11 first round rookie picks in your league do so long as the guy you take is worth more than the pick you spent on him. You need to have some understanding of what's out there in order to put his value in context and of course the more knowledge you have the better, but if you had a "Biff's Almanac" (Back to the Future 2) for even just 20% of the players in the NFL and then you just practiced average thinking for the other 80%, you'd probably accrue a nice edge.

That kind of captures the essence of my personal style, which is to focus most of my roster moves on high-certainty propositions and then defer to the wisdom of the crowd when it comes to players about whom I have no strong negative or positive feeling. In poker terms, play ABC the overwhelming majority of the time, except for those rare spots where you know with high certainty that you can make an unexpected move to win a little value. It's not quite "ideal" strategy (ideal would be making the perfect move in every single situation -- simply not realistic), but if you do that well then you'll probably build a strong team since you're not racing the cheetah, you're just racing the other guys in your league.

I strongly agree with all of this. I have written in the past how, when life events have left me with half as much time to devote to fantasy football, I didn't respond by spending half as much time evaluating every player- I responded by spending just as much time evaluating half of the players, and then effectively ignoring all of the rest. The goal isn't to be right about every single possible call ever, the goal is only to be right about the calls that you actually make. There are a lot of players in the league, but only a small fraction of them will be guys that you own, trade for, or consider trading for- and those are the only players who have any impact on how your fantasy team does.

In addition, my last article focused on what you can do if you can identify a very narrow area where you have a certain advantage and then concentrate most of your activity to exploiting that very narrow advantage. Even if you're passing up other opportunities for profit elsewhere, if you keep doing one thing and getting it right time after time, you're going to wind up with a juggernaut eventually.

 

[Biabreakable]

If you only focus on a small group of players as targets for further evaluation I agree it should make your evaluations of those specific players higher quality than your observations of players you spend little time evaluating.

What it will also do however is make your evaluation of those players become more biased. Because you have so much time invested in that specific player.

You will not be able to make a fair comparison between that player and a player you have ignored, for whatever reason.

It may be that both of these players are of equal value, or perhaps the player you dismissed/ignored is of greater value than the player you did spend a lot of time evaluating. But how could you possibly know that if you are only focused on "your guys" ?

I do not think you can make fair or relative comparisons of value between players by only focusing on a smaller subset of players.

From a practical stand point I can understand doing it. There is only so much time one has, and naturally your interest will gravitate towards players that you like more than others.

But is this idea a basis for more useful dynasty rankings?

Those rankings will be more useful to you than anyone else, who may like some players you do not, and not like other players that you do. They will have to look somewhere else for evaluation of the players/situations you skipped, and they will get slanted rankings that over value specific players because of ignoring the rest of the population.

 

[Adam Harstad]

If you only focus on a small group of players as targets for further evaluation I agree it should make your evaluations of those specific players higher quality than your observations of players you spend little time evaluating.

What it will also do however is make your evaluation of those players become more biased. Because you have so much time invested in that specific player.

You will not be able to make a fair comparison between that player and a player you have ignored, for whatever reason.

It may be that both of these players are of equal value, or perhaps the player you dismissed/ignored is of greater value than the player you did spend a lot of time evaluating. But how could you possibly know that if you are only focused on "your guys" ?

I do not think you can make fair or relative comparisons of value between players by only focusing on a smaller subset of players.

From a practical stand point I can understand doing it. There is only so much time one has, and naturally your interest will gravitate towards players that you like more than others.

But is this idea a basis for more useful dynasty rankings?

Those rankings will be more useful to you than anyone else, who may like some players you do not, and not like other players that you do. They will have to look somewhere else for evaluation of the players/situations you skipped, and they will get slanted rankings that over value specific players because of ignoring the rest of the population.

Agreed. You can't compare the guys in your focus sample to the guys outside of your focus sample. It's important to restrict your comparisons so they're strictly between guys who both fall in your focus sample. In reality, cutting your focus to half of the league cuts the number of possible moves you can make down to a quarter, because in a trade involving two players, there's only a 50% chance that either player falls in your sample (50% * 50% = 25%). Limiting your focus will dramatically restrict your options, but can leave you more certain about the moves you make within those dramatically limited possibilities.

I don't think the idea is a basis for more useful dynasty rankings from an industry-wide perspective. I do think it's a very handy trick to help an individual owner with time constraints make dynasty rankings that are more useful for himself, personally, as you noted. If you don't own Calvin Johnson and don't have an immediate chance to acquire Calvin Johnson, any time you spend evaluating him becomes wasted time. ZWK sometimes uses the phrase "thinking is for doing", which I think is apt.

At the end of the day, time is a limited resource. As much as we'd all love to spend 60 hours a week on the hobby, for most people, that's not a realistic possibility. As a result, it sometimes pays to strategically cut corners in order to maximize the value you receive from each individual unit of time you have to spend. Obviously the ideal is to have a fully-informed opinion about the entire league, but when limitations make that an impossibility and the choice comes down to having either a fully-informed opinion about half the league or a half-informed opinion about the entire league, I tend to think that the former is better and more useful.

Heck, even David Dodds, who probably ranks in the 99.99th percentile in terms of time spent on the hobby, writes his annual "eliminate the suck" articles where he basically advocates writing off a quarter of the league for fantasy purposes.

 

[EBF]

For me it's not so much about ignoring players as it is not having a strong positive or negative feeling on them one way or the other. Since I'm usually looking to gain a profit in my transactions, it makes sense for me to focus all of those moves (whether it's a draft pick, a trade, or a waiver decision) on the small population of players who I strongly believe offer a significant value gap compared with their market value.

It's not that I have no understanding of the other players whatsoever. It's just that if I don't think there's a gap between their actual value and their market value then there's very little incentive for me to buy/sell them.

 

[Biabreakable]

From a perspective of trading I can see how you might come to that conclusion, that there is no incentive in trading for a player who you think is fairly priced by the market. But I think this causes some other things to happen as well.

If you never ask the price on players who do not interest you, then you will never really know how those players are actually valued by their owners in your league. If you assume they value them at market price and there is no advantage to be gained in trading for those players that means you are eliminating those players from consideration.

Another thing that I think happens is that the players you consider value compared to market price are in effect over valued by you if the players owner values that player at market value or less. Now perhaps you are not going to pay that price in a trade, but if you apply that idea to how you do player rankings, in effect that is what you really think the player is worth. What their market value is, is something else.

It is almost a completely different kind of ranking I think. A ranking based on buy/sell targets after evaluating market value. Which isn't really the same thing as a complete dynasty ranking imo.