JoeSteeler
Footballguy
Where do you see player position changes now on MFL? I thought it used to be under help>what’s new
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IDP Training Camp News & Observations (5 Viewers)
- Thread starter JoeSteeler
- Start date
Dacomish
Footballguy
Its under reports>Players>Players additions and position changes
JoeSteeler
Footballguy
Thanks!
Pretty much kills his value IMO
I think that is a new location for that info. I think it used to be in the Help Tab under "what's new" and had a toggle between scoring changes and position changes (but I might be misremembering.
JoeSteeler
Footballguy
100%
massraider
Footballguy
It was a nice dream
JoeSteeler
Footballguy
You are right.
JoeSteeler
Footballguy
For those of us in deep DT required leagues, you may want to add Yahya Black if you have room. Has been doing well in preseason and should start for Harmon while he is out for 3-5 games.
At least someone to be aware of.
At least someone to be aware of.
KellysHeroes
Footballguy
I'm guessing thats not good for Pratt
Meh. I am not so sure Adams has much left in the tank.
The Future Champs
Footballguy
Guys who take a year off are always a low ceiling play in dynasty. The only way I end with any shares of Adams is if he’s on the wire and can cover injury/bye week problems.
massraider
Footballguy
Here's one that's interesting to me.
Anthony Walker, beat out by Dennis in TB and released, is working out for the Colts today. If he signs, I could see him taking over a 3 down role in a month or so, all he has to is beat out McGrone and Bachie.
Kyzir White visiting Colts as well.
Maybe delay that bachie party.
Anthony Walker, beat out by Dennis in TB and released, is working out for the Colts today. If he signs, I could see him taking over a 3 down role in a month or so, all he has to is beat out McGrone and Bachie.
Kyzir White visiting Colts as well.
Maybe delay that bachie party.
What about Carlies wen he comes off IR in week 4? A lot of unkown performers in the mix.
MAC_32
Footballguy
Walker signing and getting meaningful run early will be a great sign for Carlies when he's activated off IR
KellysHeroes
Footballguy
is Junior Colston NFL Career Toast?
massraider
Footballguy
Very good point
Tick
Footballguy
Seems like it. Maybe he sticks around for 6 more years like Channing Tindall.
massraider
Footballguy
Jabril Peppers cut.
Pats two unknown safeties should be closely monitored now.
Pats two unknown safeties should be closely monitored now.
MAC_32
Footballguy
I'll be looking for him if someone drops him.
KellysHeroes
Footballguy
2 lost seasons after being pumped up as LB1 in rookie draft, hard to see him turning it around in 2026
MAC_32
Footballguy
Alex Anzalone, Sirvocea Dennis, Cody Barton, Zack Baun, etc seem to have turned bumpy starts into varying forms of market. The odds now are obviously worse than they were 15 months ago, but these sorta non zero upside risks in-season are better than most alternatives, especially in the increasingly scarce LB pool.
rockaction
Footballguy
These guys are coming out of nowhere and making the RB and TE markets look totally normal.
I like him as a low cost upside play. You will know in a week or two if there is anything there. Obviously the Colts aren't happy with the guys there for the LB2 spot behind Franklin. I would also hold on Carlies as I think he is good and just needs to get healthy.
Tick
Footballguy
I'd expect him to be very deep - the coaches have said things about drafting Starks so they can keep Hamilton in the box where he's most effective.
That is my understanding as well.
JoeSteeler
Footballguy
I don’t get why they would wait so long to sign him.
massraider
Footballguy
I'm walking away from Colts.
This smells like one of those situations where the next starting LB is plucked off waivers like---three times in a season.
Someone gonna win this job, but are they gonna keep it?
This smells like one of those situations where the next starting LB is plucked off waivers like---three times in a season.
Someone gonna win this job, but are they gonna keep it?
I still think it's Carlies once he gets healthy. I think some of this churn is because he got injured the first game and never saw the field due to injury after that. He was good last year. I still believe but you have to wait until week 5 at the earliest.
massraider
Footballguy
Anyone who makes the initial 53 man rosters, gets their entire contract guaranteed. The vet minimum for Kyzir is a lot more than some late round pick. They want to start Gray/ Williams, they think. They WANT one of them to win the job, and be a long term answer. They don't want to start Kyzir.
So after final cuts, they sign him to the practice squad, which i think they did, he practices, learns the system, and if both the kids suck, they break the emergency glass.
I wouldn't be shocked if this was worked out with him a while ago, he probably had a few offers like this, and like his odds with the two young guys.
Just a guess
Sleeperz
Footballguy
That is a really good assessment. Sounds like this could be the case.
Gray and Bachie are now both listed as starters going into week 1 as well.
rockaction
Footballguy
You're probably right and I don't want to hang my hat on a journeyman PED guy but the Colts DC Lou Anarumo is Bachie's old Cincinnati DC so not only is there a familiarity with both man and system but Bachie has played incredibly well according to PFF. I think his preseason was graded at a 91.2. I've heard he looks really good.
Your mileage may vary, but who is Carlies and are the Colts that sold on him? A fifth-round pick who was 151st overall and converted from safety to linebacker once he got to the NFL? I mean, this is sort of where you're shopping for dregs and why IDP and three linebacker leagues are becoming silly. Teams give less of a **** about the LB position than they do RB. I'll admit my linebackers aren't great in my IDP league, but that's because they're not worth the draft capital (in my league) for a good one because the job seems to overwhelm most of even the pedigreed ones, and they're treated like they're detritus in the NFL. They're afterthoughts.
If Zach Baun weren’t doing things nearly unheard of then Howie Roseman would just backfill and put any old scrub out there like I've taken to doing on my fantasy team. I figure I’ll match Howie when we both play GM. I mean, that was really his philosophy and he sort of leads the way in the NFL.
Any team using their earlier picks or cap money on a linebacking corps is subject to be explained by that dumb-midwit-brilliant meme. Either you're Detroit and Philly and you use the position to attack and come in waves or you're Trent Baalke of Jacksonville (have you seen his drafts with San Francisco and Jacksonville? Holy ****, are they ever disastrous) and you keep drafting Devin Lloyds and Chad Mumas while your best player at the position is a sixth-round pick from Yale (Foyesade!) except you haven't quite learned the lesson from that.
Anyway, sorry for the rant, but you all seem to spend so much time on this position when it's really become a whole metric **** ton of luck and arbitrariness. And it's a position that doesn't seem to screen well or have prior success be indicative of pro success. There's too much going on and too many coverage responsibilities to where it mixes running back traits with quarterback processing, and that leads to the makeup and transient nature of the current LB crop.
Just my two cents.
Midwit meme explained: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/iq-bell-curve-midwit
Actually, this is where IDP Guru Ryan Sitzman plants his flag for Bachie
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rockaction
Footballguy
Sorry about that (well, not really). I've been footballing all weekend in preparation for the season and I've come to some conclusions of my own, as you might be able to tell. Heh.
warpig33
Footballguy
I live in Indy and heard a lot about Bachie and McGrone during training camps. As rockaction stated, Bachie has familiarity with the system since he was with Anarumo in Cinci. With Carlies being injured, McGrone has kind of been inserted in to his spot at WLB. In watching the preseason games, I wasn't impressed with McGrone. Seems like he gets to the play late or is easily taken out of his pursuit angles. Bachie made more splash plays and seemed to be around the ball more. Either way, the Colts are obviously unimpressed with both since they immediately went out and brought in a ton of LBs. I believe Anthony Walker played for the Colts a couple/few years ago so there is some familiarity. Muma is from a division rival and they may see him as an "insider" for when they play Jags. I thought Muma did well when he stepped in for Lloyd when Lloyd was benched/hurt. Then the jags go and cut him. And wasn't Muma a 2nd or 3rd rounder? Not sure why they cut bait so soon. But we all know how inept the jags are (as has been stated in here as well). I assume the job will go back to Carlies once he is healthy and a couple of these guys will be cut.
MAC_32
Footballguy
It seems you may be missing an opportunity. LB has never been more important in our game as the positional scarcity has never been thinner. How does one apply the NFL's reality to building the optimal room? That's where my mind has ventured the last couple-few years and while far from perfect that approach has yielded very cost efficient results. It's all about volume - when you think you've thrown enough darts, throw some more, and always be open-minded to unusual paths to a starting role. How many cases are out there of a young player not panning out at his first destination only to find a home elsewhere? Anyway, just something to chew on...
rockaction
Footballguy
(Heh. This isn't grumpy but it is long and by way of an explanation.)
Oh no, I haven't given up. Don't let that seem like a white flag. When it comes to approaching the linebacker position in our tackle-heavy league, what I've done is totally modified my approach I began with and once tried so that I don't sink expensive and precious draft capital (that I don't have anyway because I've been to the finals three years running and you have to sacrifice to stay afloat) into what the NFL treats as positional detritus. I learned the hard way. One year I used the 2.04, 2.05, and 2.11 to get my orphan up to speed with Micah Parsons, Jamin Davis, and Jeremiah Owusu-Koromoah. Those guys were three of the top four LBs chosen in the draft.
Never again. I didn't get a linebacker out of the bunch. I got Parsons for part of his very first year and JOK for half of a year. So it was disastrous. Before we went to true position, Parsons was completely unusable. I got one year of LB positional use out of a combined twelve man years among them en toto. I mean, **** that. I saw how the NFL treats and approaches the LB position. There's no stability and it's pretty much a constant test to see if the cat they threw off the building landed on its feet and immediately snagged the mouse to the master's liking.
LB has become a mixture of the devalued RB position mixed with the expectations and mental demands placed upon quarterback, although not as extreme. And if you're really good at LB and display unusual athleticism or prowess, they might turn you into an edge and totally ruin the whole thing for a tackle-heavy fantasy league. It's a little bit like banging one's head into a brick wall.
I learned and studied very quickly (took me my first three years) how they deal with the position. Hell, I I've gotten to the point where I'm sussing out and using guys like the darling of the moment Nate Landman (he who supposedly came out of nowhere this year). And I'm finding those guys not the year before they break but the year before that, even—like when he first popped up in the league. I was there to claim him off of waivers. Of course, I let him go because he's another pasty "non-athlete" that the NFL seems to denigrate, cut, and then recycle and love the very next year.
Oh ho! Don't think I've quit. I just know that the NFL is completely situational and system-determinative.
I will say that I'm never going to spend the time to know every coach and what they want out of their linebackers. I don't play in money leagues and there's absolutely no return on my investment of time, and I'd say there are times like this week where I've already spent over a full work week on this hobby, so the shenanigans have to stop at some point—lines must be drawn somewhere. I mean, I honestly haven't been to bed in forty-eight hours and I'm clearly verbose and charming as all get-out right now. LOL.
But I have taken my cues from the NFL and I won't waste a cent of draft capital on it when it's totally precious. I was surprised Roseman pivoted this year and actually sunk something into his corps. I laughed ruefully. Have we come full circle? We will see and time will tell. But until then I just laugh and I think of that midwit meme and think of Howie and chuckle.
MAC_32
Footballguy
Here's the thing - what you're describing is how the market seems to be reacting too. I don't bother citing ADP data for IDP because it's too unreliable, but what I've observed in my 3 leagues has appeared to align with the sentiment I've read in this sub-forum, twitter, reddit, etc.
I went several years without committing meaningful draft capital into LB. I didn't examine every league, but the subject came up in one league chat so I reviewed that one. As it turns out I spent one top 30 pick on the position across the last 7 years and am in the top 3 in LB points scored over that time. Now, sure, there's been some luck in getting to that point, but my relative de-valuing of LB's in rookie drafts was simply because I thought others over-valued them. If I'm dialing up a LB before the late 2nd then they better have a near zero probability of not starting soon. The position being de-valued by the NFL should not be yielding likely starters at that position of the draft, but that's how they were treated, and that dynamic flowed upwards from there. The tide's shifted the last couple years. Dudes that used to be drafted late rd 1 / early rd 2 are falling a half dozen or more picks. The market is over-reacting. i.e. the Browns GM Andrew Berry comes from the Howie Roseman tree and has treated LB accordingly, so when he committed pick 36 draft capital to an ILB that got my attention...but not my league mates. He fell to the mid-late 2nd rd in all of them, something that would be unheard of just a few years ago, and he appears to be a green dot from the outset.
That's what I mean by there being an opportunity you're missing. You don't need to devote 40 hours / week to get to these conclusions either.
I went several years without committing meaningful draft capital into LB. I didn't examine every league, but the subject came up in one league chat so I reviewed that one. As it turns out I spent one top 30 pick on the position across the last 7 years and am in the top 3 in LB points scored over that time. Now, sure, there's been some luck in getting to that point, but my relative de-valuing of LB's in rookie drafts was simply because I thought others over-valued them. If I'm dialing up a LB before the late 2nd then they better have a near zero probability of not starting soon. The position being de-valued by the NFL should not be yielding likely starters at that position of the draft, but that's how they were treated, and that dynamic flowed upwards from there. The tide's shifted the last couple years. Dudes that used to be drafted late rd 1 / early rd 2 are falling a half dozen or more picks. The market is over-reacting. i.e. the Browns GM Andrew Berry comes from the Howie Roseman tree and has treated LB accordingly, so when he committed pick 36 draft capital to an ILB that got my attention...but not my league mates. He fell to the mid-late 2nd rd in all of them, something that would be unheard of just a few years ago, and he appears to be a green dot from the outset.
That's what I mean by there being an opportunity you're missing. You don't need to devote 40 hours / week to get to these conclusions either.
superbearssuperbowl
Footballguy
Wait… you dont play in money leagues??? Why in the world are you spending so much time on this then? Let alone writing in a small IDP forum? And you havent slept in 48 hours? Blink twice if you need help…
rockaction
Footballguy
I just wrote something really long here. I should just assure you that I understand your argument and very much disagree. My basic argument in my deleted post was that I don't think this is a good example at all. First of all, my point was that I was finding it less fun doing all this work over minutiae because it's a time drain that I'm unwilling to do anymore. This is only partly because of time. It's also because I'm not really willing to do it due to the conclusion I've come to that I don't think knowledge—even at the most penetratingly exact discernment of that minutiae—really gets you anywhere as far as fantasy football goes vis a vis linebackers in a tackle-heavy league.
This example you gave is kind of perfect to prove my point. It sort of does the opposite of what you suggest. First of all, you're saying that if people knew every front office they could beat the market and know how to act. Well, first of all, it's convenient for you to point to something Cleveland did because you're a Cleveland fan. But that totally aside and rendering it irrelevant, I'd posit you couldn't have known to burn high fantasy draft capital on Schwesinger (the player in question) in the 2025 draft. The reason you couldn't have known how this would work out is because this same exact front office/coach combination used a similar pick on a linebacker in 2021—and I brought him up in my example! It was JOK, and they spent a high pick on him only for him to not see a role nor time enough to become a fantasy-relevant starter but for half a year in his career. He was injured and when he wasn't they ditched him for . . . the scrap heap I'm complaining about. So my complaint is directed almost exactly at this type of front office that you say that if you only knew their philosophy you could beat the market. I disagree because they were in a very similar situation and did exactly the type of thing I lament. Their draft capital told you nothing about how they would act, contra what you're claiming.
So my contention is that I actually did know this front office, and I don't think you can put any stock in what they do when they take a linebacker with a high draft pick. If you say you can, you certainly can't say you were acting upon their priors, you know? There's really nothing you had but draft capital (which they've ignored before) and their need (which they've had before). So if you're comfortable taking a chance with your limited draft capital in fantasy that's all well and good, but to say that somebody else who refuses to do that doesn't know the front office or the market seems terribly wrong to me because this very front office has done the exact opposite of what you're positing a fantasy player who knows them should be able to predict (or at least not willing to consider somebody else's risk aversion). That doesn't pass the smell test.
So that's what I'm trying to say. I should say that in real life I didn't have any picks because I've been in the finals three straight years with a championship along the way. I've had to burn them to stay afloat given that our previous year's finish determines the amount of our FAAB dollars and then you're assessing weaknesses in your lineup with the urgency of winning now. So the point is really moot. But I can't accept the assertion that you can either beat the market or suss these things out on a case-by-case basis if only you knew. The NFL treats their players too arbitrarily, especially at LB, to say that you can achieve a good track record investing your own draft capital in these guys and that it's due to a specialized knowledge. Given the hit rates that even guys in the IDP industry that do this every day and all day have, I find that claim hard to accept. The hit rates are terrible, even for first and second-round picks. I can't crunch numbers, but really think about it. It barely works for the NFL, never mind fantasy.
Anyway, I just want to give a defense that I've considered what you've said and have problems with the example you provided as if it were a microcosm that will solve the problem. I've thought deeply about it and I've come to the conclusion that there's no real signal in NFL draft capital nor can we figure out what will work by detailed and reasonable case-by-case investigation—I think we're actually sort of stranded in no-mans land as far as judgment and linebackers go.
I mean, I only knew JOK would be out for a long time because of Jordan Hicks's instagram. His coaches didn't even know. Nor did the GM. That's getting into a level of micro-knowledge that I was like, "****. Nobody knows a thing about whether this guy is paralyzed even. What am I supposed to do?" It was then, as I'm trawling Hicks's Instagram and parsing his words, that I realized how ridiculously stupid this has become. I mean, I'd known it for a long time, but the point was just hammered home and became explicitly clear right there.
Now, we might think we have good hit rates with these guys and that we do well with it, but I've read every IDP publication and hit every show the past six years and the hit rates other than by casting your net huge and wide are terrible. And the ability to cast that net wide is dependent on your league. Like, you might be beating your mates if you have ninety-man rosters and taxi squads, but my particular league doesn't. I mean, if I could stash five-ten guys I'd have no problem backfilling the relevant LBs. But we have fifty-one man rosters and we cut down to forty protected at times for eight separate and defined positions. I mean, that's not much room to cast a net.
So the conclusion could be to play in a different league and that might color how we see this debate. My contention that it's damn arbitrary might have a lot to do with my league structure and I should probably have addressed that more. Naturally I'm egocentric and think my league is the way everyone is operating. It clearly isn't. Not even close. Having a three-linebacker requirement in my league (and I'd venture in most) is just plain old stupid in my estimation and only adds to the luck factor of it all.
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rockaction
Footballguy
And this wasn't to get on you, MAC. Nor was it to insist that if I can't do it then nobody can. It's to say that I've considered what you've said already and we might just be coming to different conclusions, but like I said, I've considered it at great length and I still think I'm closer than you think I am. I think the hit rates of linebackers with NFL draft capital in the first and second rounds is abysmal if you're talking about fantasy hit rates, and I've found that if they do hit that it has taken so long to develop these guys that it's a complete waste because of the timing and incubation. It doesn't allow you to address or plan for your fantasy team's needs. They're like a phoenix rising from the ashes only to find that it's no longer needed and, sir, could you not breathe please? We're in a place that's a fire hazard.
I think there are three ways to approach this if the leagues are insistent on having three LBs as the standard positional requirement. The first is to use your fantasy draft capital on these guys, which given their hit rates for fantasy purposes, strikes me as a wildly inefficient use of your own resources. The second is to use all your time and energy trawling the waiver wire backfilling guys. This requires both an inordinate amount of time and is really only achieved by paying for subscriptions, surfing Twitter to get the low down on the coachspeak to determine what cast-off fifth-rate guy you're going to hunt down, or following each team's beat reporters so that you can add these transient players to your dynasty squad; and I've already told everybody my tolerance for that these days. So the third thing you can do about it is you can throw up your hands and essentially punt the position other than perfunctorily so that you might concentrate your capital and energies on a position and players that with a little pluck and the right mindset and stats you can suss out and predict with a little more consistency than you can the linebacker position.
I think I choose the third. I'll never totally give up on LB, but this goose chase we're on seems nigh impossible, really. I don't know. I've also finished up there in LB points. I've finished first one year and I am generally competent the past four years (I think I've been managing for six seasons). But I'm not wasting my draft picks on LBs nor am I wasting my energy any longer. The juice is not worth the squeeze in the league I play in.
I think there are three ways to approach this if the leagues are insistent on having three LBs as the standard positional requirement. The first is to use your fantasy draft capital on these guys, which given their hit rates for fantasy purposes, strikes me as a wildly inefficient use of your own resources. The second is to use all your time and energy trawling the waiver wire backfilling guys. This requires both an inordinate amount of time and is really only achieved by paying for subscriptions, surfing Twitter to get the low down on the coachspeak to determine what cast-off fifth-rate guy you're going to hunt down, or following each team's beat reporters so that you can add these transient players to your dynasty squad; and I've already told everybody my tolerance for that these days. So the third thing you can do about it is you can throw up your hands and essentially punt the position other than perfunctorily so that you might concentrate your capital and energies on a position and players that with a little pluck and the right mindset and stats you can suss out and predict with a little more consistency than you can the linebacker position.
I think I choose the third. I'll never totally give up on LB, but this goose chase we're on seems nigh impossible, really. I don't know. I've also finished up there in LB points. I've finished first one year and I am generally competent the past four years (I think I've been managing for six seasons). But I'm not wasting my draft picks on LBs nor am I wasting my energy any longer. The juice is not worth the squeeze in the league I play in.
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This is kinda the case for almost every position. Nobody knows what will happen. The best you can do is get educated and then decide from there how you want to proceed. I mean, that is fantasy football if you want to be diligent about it.
On the other hand, there are plenty of resources to just give you an ordered list based on that minutiae that allows you to make a guess based on someone else's research. You can do just fine with that approach these days (especially on offense). Defense is a bit more difficult as there isn't the volume of "experts" putting out information. That's kinda the fun part of IDP. It brings FF back into the golden age when you can get a leg up on the league by doing the research.
Now doing the research and being right are two very different things. The LB's you mentioned missing on weren't all misses. Parsons was not a miss and even though he wasn't at LB he was still very valuable as a DL so that wasn't a miss. It might not have gotten you a LB but that has more to do with the industry going to true position designations than "missing" on the pick. JOK was great anytime he was on the field for IDP purposes. It took him a year or so to get regular time but he was a quality IDP asset until his unfortunate neck injury. I would consider that a hit as well even if the end result sucks but you can't really judge a pick on a fluke injury when considering if your process was right or wrong. Jamin Davis was just a miss. How much of that was on Washington just not using him properly (IMO) or him not being good we probably won't know for sure. Although, his poor results having moved on from Was probably points in to he just missed as a prospect and wasn't good.
As far as Schwesinger goes it's yet to be seen but all indications are that he will meet expectations (at least for play time) then it's on him to stay healthy and actually produce. But I think the process of figuring out if he is worthy of a high rookie pick is still well worth the effort regardless of the actual outcome. I mean that is kind of why we play IDP.
rockaction
Footballguy
Hey Gally, thanks for the response. I wrote a really long response, but I want to edit it for tone and clarity.
I should summarize briefly. It is the case that every position has uncertain outcomes and I think I acknowledge that in my posts (if I did not, then it was an oversight) but I think that trying to pin down a usable linebacker in a tackle-heavy dynasty league format (those two adjectives are very important) that requires three linebackers quite simply requires a different type of roster allowance than our league currently allows given our roster size, our positional requirements, and our scoring.
I think that's what I'm really getting at. It might sound like I'm walking it back, but I was expressing a personal frustration about a specific league and drawing a broader conclusion within that context. I just wrote like two pages, but you all didn't sign up for that (lol).
I do want to say that JOK was not usable but for half of a year. His ranking at the beginning of every season was not within the top thirty. I specifically remember. And things went sideways in his career with injuries (which does not bolster my point but could hurt it) and with effectiveness due to his size, which you'd think the coaches would have known since it was a sticking point during the draft.
The Parsons problem was something I addressed by saying that Parsons was a problem for tackle-heavy leagues that hadn't switched to true position yet. I sort of wasn't really using him but for being a cautionary tale. The arbitrariness of him being switched to defensive line and me not being able to use him for a year and a half because while he was on the defensive line he was still listed as a linebacker cost me a year and a half of 2.04 draft capital, which is a significant cost. And the tackle-heaviness problem doesn't stop with him. See Frankie Luvu and Dan Quinn right now. I happened to have Luvu before he was turned into a pass rusher. Now, I've had bad luck. Those are the two guys in the past five years that has happened to. But it did happen and the point of my argument was that things are pretty arbitrary and that investing fantasy draft capital into LBs is inefficient for that very reason.
Anyway, I'll clarify more, but I think I've got a bit of a bead on it. I've been taking it seriously and living it. It's just what I've concluded. And I'm hesitant to write more because I'm not in a spirit where I feel aggrieved or anything. Simply frustrated and making a point.
MAC_32
Footballguy
What you're describing appears to be similar to the league I added Schwesinger. To be clear, I'm not sharing this to toot my own horn, but rather as a perspective to consider rather than punting the position. Each year we cut down to 34 with a 7 person taxi (2 years of experience or less). Right now 10 of those spots are committed to LB's, which isn't unusual. Due to the volatility of the position I think it's important to have a mixture of vets & yutes and restrict investment; below are acquisition prices
Luvu - free agent dart from several years ago
Milano - free agent dart from several years before Luvu
Greenlaw - pick 4.3 from 2019
T Andersen - pick 2.12 from 2022
C Gray - pick 5.9 from 2024
Speights - free agent dart from last summer
To'oTo'o - free agent dart from last summer
Carlies - free agent dart from last fall
Schwesinger - traded 2.12 and 3.12 this year for pick 2.9 and took him
C Simon - free agent dart from this summer
Some of those guys are going to miss, some arguably already have, but I expect some of them to hit, and if I hit enough of them I may trade them too. Ultimately, I try to ensure I have at least 5 that I can play any given time, but if I have more (I might this year) there's usually opportunities to move them (I know I moved McFadden last year, feel like there was another too). Is something like this not attainable in your league? I really don't spend much time at all scouring the bottom of the barrel. Pre rookie draft (post NFL) I identify scenarios to be ready for, post-draft I'll look at those that slipped through (including vets), and during the season I look for potential opportunities. There's not a science to what I do in-season, but many weeks in-season I don't devote more time than however long I'm on the can Tuesday morning and I'm mostly checked out in the offseason except for late April - mid May. I could devote more time if I wanted to prioritize it, but this seems to be working as is so I'm not going to until there's a reason to consider changing.
Sorry if I touched a nerve
rockaction
Footballguy
MAC, thanks for the response. A bunch. No, you didn't touch a nerve. If I've conveyed that then I've been misfiring in tone. I just want to explain in detail what I think about the situation in our league and where it's become difficult for me to treat LBs as anything but a sort of stressful thing. My linebacking corps looks similar to yours in the method of construction without the quality of guys like Schwesinger or Milano. That To'oTo'o, Speights, and Milano were free agents in your league is something that probably wouldn't happen in our league. Our rosters are bigger, so that's naturally the case.
I think, if I'm honest about it, I might just have had a bit of bad luck or have cut guys that I might have left when I see your roster. I have almost no draft capital used in mine right now partially due to my own experience and partially due to tracking other people's experiences. I have used capital before. I took Parsons with a 2.04 when he came out and they turned him into a DL. I took Jamin Davis (total bust you just couldn't ever use) that same year with the 2.05 and then JOK with the 2.11 to finish it off. I figured they would anchor the room and I would use free agency to fill in any gaps.
That didn't work out at all. Micah had about half a year of playing MLB for Dallas and then he was strictly DL, and like I explained, he was totally useless for 1.5 years. J. Davis was a bust and unusable and JOK was never a stalwart or he was injured and I traded him this year because he's in some sort of physical condition that you can't really get anyone to talk about on the record, and they've replaced him with Schwesinger.
Our LB rooms' methodology is very similar, though. I also added Cody Simon this summer, and if you want to equate Nate Landman with a guy like Milano, I had him but cut him in a roster crunch last year after having held him for two years when he was not playing in Atlanta. I certainly could have added Carlies last year and was on top of it (we talked about it in this very forum) but our transactions cost money, and due to the fact that I received the second-least allotment and had spent a bunch of it, I wasn't able to add guys at times because I was playoff-bound and needed it for the extra three weeks. That budget crunch adds to the frustration of our league. But there are similarities we share. I also have Luvu in my linebacker corps. My LBs are weak right now, but for the most part it has looked suspiciously like yours save for the times I get extended and have to cut somebody from the roster. It's also partially the pains of going to three straight finals and what I have to do to stay afloat.
My vociferousness, I guess, comes from the desire to have the best rooms of all the positions in a way that's appropriate for our league scoring, which is weighted towards offense no matter how much our league concentrates on the full IDP part of it all. I traded Parsons for Brian Thomas Jr. before Thomas even approached going nuts (it was Week 2 or 3) and it was pretty much acknowledged that the way our league is that it was a really good deal for me.
I also really wanted to make the theoretical point that in a tackle-heavy league slightly skewed towards offense it doesn't make sense to use those draft picks on LBs because of the vagaries of the position in the NFL. I've taken a keen interest in it, and I just don't see much reason to use draft capital. For every Schwesinger (and Gally rightly points out he hasn't necessarily hit) there's a Jack Campbell that went in our first round and hasn't hit yet. It's been three years. Devin Lloyd went in the first in our league. Now that looks like a disaster. It might be where our league drafts, but I don't see even a round later why I would spend the draft capital on a position I honestly think is so dependent on each situation, organization, player, and coach that you really can't predict with confidence or accuracy, so your heavy capital and even dart throws seem better spent elsewhere. That's what I'm trying to advance with all this text.
It's not really a nerve or being upset. This is just how I think and my reasoning. I will say that in our league, Gally has an excellent LB room. But they're unfortunately devalued compared to the offensive guys and I think he will tell you it is often difficult to find value in a trade. It's just that way.
So that's about it. I hope that clears up both the substantive nature of what I'm saying and also the tonal/emotional part of it. I plan to keep playing and when I say I'm "punting" LB what I mean is that I'm actually going to keep constructing it a lot like you are, just minus that 2.09 for Schwesinger. That's really the biggest difference. Peace.
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This is really the biggest reason to not spend much time on finding diamonds in the rough. They just don't really matter in the overall scheme of the league. It's something that I "missed" when I joined. I went hard on the IDP side because in my other league this is where you gain a big advantage. Unfortunately (as you know), our league just isn't set up for IDP side to matter significantly. It matters but not difference making matters.
In addition, trying to trade IDP for offense is near impossible to get appropriate value in return because of this discrepancy. It just makes it more frustrating.
rockaction
Footballguy
I think I might have been editing while you were typing, but you can probably see I that I mentioned you and how good your LB room is, but that you have difficulty trading.
I will concede that what I'm saying would absolutely not work for a league like the league you play in (whose scoring you showed to me) where there is just much more of a balance and where defense is going to win games without a doubt. Perhaps what I'm agitating over is really more league-specific than I originally thought, but there are a ton of tackle-heavy leagues that are likely weighted somewhat similarly to the one I've been talking about (although our sack points are sort of way too undervalued).
