The “oops I won’t do that again”… (1 Viewer)

[Joe Bryant]

Do a lot of experts track results? In my experience, no but I don't often look at consensus rankings or positional pick lists.

How would that even be scored to determine accuracy? If I rank 32 QBs do I get a point for each QB who finishes above a QB I ranked lower? Do I really deserve a point when Josh Allen finishes above Jacoby Brisset & Tyler Heinicke?

If I rank Kyler Murray 3rd and he finishes 4th is that a fail?

Judging success & failure of ranking actually seems pretty complicated, with plenty of opportunity to overstate success.

And that's before we even try to factor in different scoring systems & roster limits which adds infinite more complications.

The best I can offer is the WDIS thread I am running each week. I track all my either/or recommendations (only those involving two players, not "pick 2 of 5" type scenarios for the reasons stated above) for a given week, then in the following weeks thread I post how many I got correct, according to my specific league scoring rules, and how many a coin flip got correct. Right now the coin and I are neck-and-neck.

All that being said picking Lance over Herbert seems like an obvious mistake of overthinking a situation.

To be fair, Lance ran the ball 16 times (and passed it 29) so the opportunity to exceed Herbert did exist. Herbert won't outproduce Lance every week but he should most weeks.

Thank you @Chaka you're getting into a(nother!) huge area of discussion. What makes an expert "good"? 

In my experience, it's way more subjective than it likely should be. The guy who missed on a ton of players but correctly identified the guy who broke out is seen as awesome. 

And the guy who got lots of things right but went against the grain on a player and ranked him low when he did well is a guy "who doesn't know what he's talking about".

It's a challenge for sure. And I still haven't come up with a way to grade I feel great about. 

 

[Gilroy34]

Swapped out Chase for AJ Brown right before kick off

 

[ignatiusjreilly]

Thank you @Chaka you're getting into a(nother!) huge area of discussion. What makes an expert "good"? 

In my experience, it's way more subjective than it likely should be. The guy who missed on a ton of players but correctly identified the guy who broke out is seen as awesome. 

And the guy who got lots of things right but went against the grain on a player and ranked him low when he did well is a guy "who doesn't know what he's talking about".

It's a challenge for sure. And I still haven't come up with a way to grade I feel great about. 

Doesn't FantasyPros have some sort of accuracy ranking system for experts? But you're right that there's no way to truly capture what makes someone "good". Ideally, you would want someone who identifies the contrarian plays that turn out great. But if you incentivize that too much, then people will just make a bunch of contrarian calls and memory-hole the ones that don't work out. And what does it even mean to get something "wrong"? If you ranked Saquon or Daniel Jones high this week and then they got injured, that's not your fault. But what about Clyde, who didn't seem to be doing much even before he got hurt?

My system when I have a lineup dilemma is generally a) check consensus rankings, b) check the rankings of a couple fantasy analysts I particularly trust, and c) go with my gut. I also try not to sweat it too much. Most decisions, whether they're right or wrong, won't end up swinging your match-up. My biggest dilemma this week was Jacobs or DWilliams as my RB2. The consensus heavily favored Williams, my gut told me Jacobs. So I went with him ... and they finished within a point of each other.

 

[ignatiusjreilly]

Swapped out Chase for AJ Brown right before kick off

I have a rule of no lineup changes within an hour of kickoff (absent obvious situations where a guy is a late scratch). If I do it and it blows up in my face, I spend the rest of the day berating myself. Not worth the agita.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I have a rule of no lineup changes within an hour of kickoff (absent obvious situations where a guy is a late scratch). If I do it and it blows up in my face, I spend the rest of the day berating myself. Not worth the agita.

That's probably not a bad rule to have.

 

[zamboni]

Thank you @Chaka you're getting into a(nother!) huge area of discussion. What makes an expert "good"? 

In my experience, it's way more subjective than it likely should be. The guy who missed on a ton of players but correctly identified the guy who broke out is seen as awesome. 

And the guy who got lots of things right but went against the grain on a player and ranked him low when he did well is a guy "who doesn't know what he's talking about".

It's a challenge for sure. And I still haven't come up with a way to grade I feel great about. 

One of the many reasons I really like JJ Zachariason is that he almost always goes back the following week over his previous sleepers/recommendations and says where he went wrong and right. He may miss a lot like everyone, but he has a process and stands by it.

 

[wlwiles]

I sat Buffalo defense (15 pts) for LAC defense (-3).  Lost my matchup by 11 pts.  Buffalo's been so stout all year but Mahomes scared me and in this league points allowed is penalized pretty heavily >24 points, so I feared a shootout. I learned my lesson, Buffalo is my set it and forget it RoS. 

 

[TampaMike19]

Which expert ranked Lance above Herbert?

Me- I'm the expert lmao 

I regret this decision immediately - played with fire and stared at opposing projections.

#### projections- anything can happen anytime 

 

[Sam Quentin]

Do a lot of experts track results? In my experience, no but I don't often look at consensus rankings or positional pick lists.

How would that even be scored to determine accuracy? If I rank 32 QBs do I get a point for each QB who finishes above a QB I ranked lower? Do I really deserve a point when Josh Allen finishes above Jacoby Brisset & Tyler Heinicke?

If I rank Kyler Murray 3rd and he finishes 4th is that a fail?

Judging success & failure of ranking actually seems pretty complicated, with plenty of opportunity to overstate success.

And that's before we even try to factor in different scoring systems & roster limits which adds infinite more complications.

The best I can offer is the WDIS thread I am running each week. I track all my either/or recommendations (only those involving two players, not "pick 2 of 5" type scenarios for the reasons stated above) for a given week, then in the following weeks thread I post how many I got correct, according to my specific league scoring rules, and how many a coin flip got correct. Right now the coin and I are neck-and-neck.

All that being said picking Lance over Herbert seems like an obvious mistake of overthinking a situation.

To be fair, Lance ran the ball 16 times (and passed it 29) so the opportunity to exceed Herbert did exist. Herbert won't outproduce Lance every week but he should most weeks.

I don’t know how other people do it, but I would input every permutation of two players at each position, see who the rankings picked and then see if the ranking pick had more points.  If yes, it’s success, else it a fail.  I would weight these by point differential to get a total.

Things nobody can foresee always happen, but the larger sample sizes should even out the luck factor.

 

[Chaka]

I don’t know how other people do it, but I would input every permutation of two players at each position, see who the rankings picked and then see if the ranking pick had more points.  If yes, it’s success, else it a fail.  I would weight these by point differential to get a total.

Things nobody can foresee always happen, but the larger sample sizes should even out the luck factor.

So if Josh Allen, Tom Brady & Zach Wilson were ranked 1, 2 & 32 going into this week would you get 1 point for Allen beating Brady (barely) and 31 points for Allen beating Wilson?

 

[Sam Quentin]

So if Josh Allen, Tom Brady & Zach Wilson were ranked 1, 2 & 32 going into this week would you get 1 point for Allen beating Brady (barely) and 31 points for Allen beating Wilson?

For the binary view

 1 pt for allen beating Brady , 1 pt for allen beating Wilson and 1 point for brady beating Wilson 

for the weighted view, assume pt totals of 30, 29 and 12 

 It would be +1 (30-29), +18 (30-12) and +17(29-12)

 

[TampaMike19]

I have a rule of no lineup changes within an hour of kickoff (absent obvious situations where a guy is a late scratch). If I do it and it blows up in my face, I spend the rest of the day berating myself. Not worth the agita.

Setting lineups first thing Sunday Morning or Saturday morning is a great way to live. This was me yesterday- I'm not going to make an adjustment going forward. If it's a later game and I'm a huge underdog and have a chance to sub in variance, perhaps I will do that, but I need to do that less

 

[eighsse]

Swapped out Chase* for AJ Brown right before kick off

*Woods = Me

 

[ignatiusjreilly]

Setting lineups first thing Sunday Morning or Saturday morning is a great way to live. This was me yesterday- I'm not going to make an adjustment going forward. If it's a later game and I'm a huge underdog and have a chance to sub in variance, perhaps I will do that, but I need to do that less

Rationally speaking, starting the wrong player should be equally annoying whether you a) swap in a new starter earlier in the week, b) consider swapping in a new starter but decide not to, or c) swap someone in right before kickoff. But I think everyone would agree that, somehow, the last option feels way worse.  There's probably some psychological explanation for it.

 

[socrates]

Thank you @Chaka you're getting into a(nother!) huge area of discussion. What makes an expert "good"? 

In my experience, it's way more subjective than it likely should be. The guy who missed on a ton of players but correctly identified the guy who broke out is seen as awesome. 

And the guy who got lots of things right but went against the grain on a player and ranked him low when he did well is a guy "who doesn't know what he's talking about".

It's a challenge for sure. And I still haven't come up with a way to grade I feel great about. 

Experts are going to make wrong predictions.  For me, it is less about the accuracy and more about the analysis behind the prediction.  I tend to gravitate back to those experts who "show their work" and consistently apply sound reasoning.  With so many "experts" out there, I usually try to avoid those who are routinely chasing the shock factor.

Also, I never follow any expert's rankings blindly.  I digest the advice of various experts, then I filter it through my own experience and analysis.

 

[Blackbear]

Experts are going to make wrong predictions.  For me, it is less about the accuracy and more about the analysis behind the prediction.  I tend to gravitate back to those experts who "show their work" and consistently apply sound reasoning.  With so many "experts" out there, you have to identify those who are chasing the shock factor.

Also, I never follow any expert's rankings blindly.  I digest the advice of various experts, then I filter it through my own experience and analysis.

You may know this already… but Fantasypros has a start sit comparison tool between two players and it gives you the consensus amongst many industry experts. I find it useful to help me if I think something is a coin flip. 

 

[socrates]

You may know this already… but Fantasypros has a start sit comparison tool between two players and it gives you the consensus amongst many industry experts. I find it useful to help me if I think something is a coin flip. 

I am not familiar with this tool.  Thanks.  There are those times when, you're right, it comes down to a coin flip, and a consensus comparison might be beneficial.

 

[acme]

I saw the Patriot D was available so I put out a bigger than normal bid. I figured they had Houston this week and the Jets in two weeks. Also, I wanted to make sure the guy I was playing didn’t use them against me. Brilliant!

When I looked to see if I won the bid I realized it was the Pats team kicker not the D. 
 

I won the bid and now have a back up kicker.

Pats kicked a lot of FGs against Houston...  congrats?

 

[GroveDiesel]

This is actually a pretty huge area for discussion. And probably not what y'all want to hear as I'm guessing this is more a venting thread.

But the "wrong decision" vs "bad decision" is a thing.

I told hundreds of thousands of people a few years back that LeVeon Bell would come to his senses and not hold out for the season.

Obviously, that was the wrong decision. I failed our customers who expect us to make right decisions.

But knowing what I knew then, and factoring everything in, I don't think it was a "bad" decision. Meaning, knowing what I knew at the time, I feel certain I'd make the same decision again. 

It's a good excercise to walk through. 

I think figuring out if a process is good or not is one of the more difficult things in fantasy. Outside of known studs, figuring out which pre-season rankings are off based on mis-judging the situation and which are off based off of schedule/bad luck/circumstances beyond their control that will likely change is very difficult, and yet crucial, early in a season. Giving up on a player too early can bite you, but so can holding a player too long causing you to pass up a better option.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I think figuring out if a process is good or not is one of the more difficult things in fantasy. Outside of known studs, figuring out which pre-season rankings are off based on mis-judging the situation and which are off based off of schedule/bad luck/circumstances beyond their control that will likely change is very difficult, and yet crucial, early in a season. Giving up on a player too early can bite you, but so can holding a player too long causing you to pass up a better option.

I'm with you, GB.