Why do so very few sites that do player rankings NOT do Offensive Line rankings? (1 Viewer)

[Yah_Shoor_Yoobetchya]

O-lines are a very integral part of how passing & rushing players perform.

People regularly speak of how "anybody can do well behind that Dallas Cowboys O-line."

Where are the rankings supporting this kind of analysis?

 

[ConnSKINS26]

Honestly? Because you can analyze skill player performance with less knowledge of the game, to a degree. There are a lot less fantasy analysts out there "qualified" to break down OL play and performance. It's not about stats and projections with OL, it's film work and a deeper understanding of the game.

 

[Tool]

Great question.

 

[ComfortablyNumb]

Why do so few people understand that a double negative should not be used in a sentence?

 

[spider321]

Why do so few people understand that a double negative should not be used in a sentence?

The title isn't a double negative; it just doesn't say what the OP thinks it says.

In his defense, he isn't not from Tennessee.

 

[Deamon]

I would assume that a lot of rankings have Offensive Line quality already built into their rankings.  So adding just Oline rankings may cause you to bump a RB behind the #1 OL when they've already been bumped, causing too high a ranking.

 

[tone1oc]

Offensive line play is very elastic year to year.   One injury can ruin the whole unit, just as one key addition can make a unit great.  You could never analyze tape, stats, etc and know if adding/subtracting player X is good/bad and even further how good/bad it would be.   It would mostly be an exercise in futility, and in fantasy, skill players can overcome terrible line play or play terrible behind great line play.   You're not going to not draft Gurley because his offensive line was one of the worst last year, just like you shouldn't of drafted Joseph Randle (at his price tag) last year because he played behind one of the best. 

 

[Ruffrodys05]

OL rankings aren't a necessity, they're a luxury, with regards to FF sites that produce/provide skill position rankings. I believe only recently has FBG been providing them, when Matt Bitonti was brought on board. While I don't necessarily need the o-lines ranked, the information provided about each teams unit is what is especially useful to me. 

No idea why more sites don't provide them, but I appreciate that FBG does. Bitonti's rankings are fluid throughout the season, which is even more useful.

 

[Shutout]

Because...offensive line.  

Hardly anyone plays in a league where you get fantasy points for them so there's no sense in the time (and website space on the viewing page) it would take to put it together and post.

That plus it would be as vanilla and generic as it gets, moreso than how groupthink inundates the consensus with skill positions.  If we had it, it would read something like "everyone knows the Cowboys have a great line, blah blah blah."  And it really doesn't change anything.  All those years the Jags were (still are?) terrible with line play, it didn't stop one single person from taking MJD where people said MJD should fall.

 

[Chadstroma]

Because there is no demand directly to it.

Any decent review of an individual player on offense, be it QB, RB, WR or TE will take into account the quality of the O-line that they are working with as well as it does the quality of the other position players that they play with. So, though it may be nice, there really is not obvious need for it.

That being said, I would say that more attention could be focused on it in a holistic review of a player as most mentions are either because the player is working with one of the best or worst offensive lines. That is great for 5 or 6 teams that are obviously really good or really bad at the offensive line play but having an above average, average or below average line does impact the review of a player as well.

 

[Bracie Smathers]

Lack of easily accessible and trackable stats.

You will find offensive line rankings from past seasons if you look but check out how those teams with top-ranked offensive lines fared with fantasy production and there isn't a direct connection from what I have seen.

Before I would bother with offensive line rankings I would first want to see what sort of impact that highly ranked offensive lines had on fantasy skill production.

Do only the top three highly ranked offensive lines have a proven statistical direct correlation to fantasy skill production or is there a different cut off point, or is there no or a weak correlation?    

First, I'd like to see that data before I'd get all worked up about trying to track down offensive line data.

 

[Arodin]

Lack of easily accessible and trackable stats.

You will find offensive line rankings from past seasons if you look but check out how those teams with top-ranked offensive lines fared with fantasy production and there isn't a direct connection from what I have seen.

Before I would bother with offensive line rankings I would first want to see what sort of impact that highly ranked offensive lines had on fantasy skill production.

Do only the top three highly ranked offensive lines have a proven statistical direct correlation to fantasy skill production or is there a different cut off point, or is there no or a weak correlation?    

First, I'd like to see that data before I'd get all worked up about trying to track down offensive line data.

Although your proposed correlation studies are sound, and would be excellent reading if someone did this using PFF ranks or whatever metrics ARE out there, I'd take a different approach.

If we actually had meaningful OL stats, I'd be beating the drum to add OL (team or better yet individual) to our fantasy drafts/rosters.  I expect the FF community would crowdsource all sorts of interesting analytics once that took hold.

Trouble is, no quantifiable game by game stats means no way for OL to score FP independent of their offensive skill position teammates.

 

[Bracie Smathers]

Although your proposed correlation studies are sound, and would be excellent reading if someone did this using PFF ranks or whatever metrics ARE out there, I'd take a different approach.

If we actually had meaningful OL stats, I'd be beating the drum to add OL (team or better yet individual) to our fantasy drafts/rosters.  I expect the FF community would crowdsource all sorts of interesting analytics once that took hold.

Trouble is, no quantifiable game by game stats means no way for OL to score FP independent of their offensive skill position teammates.




1

 A major issue is subjective rankings.  Rankings that do not match up.  Discrepancies.  So you have to add another layer on who do you trust and why?  

The whole concept of offensive line rankings intuitively appeal to fantasy players but it has never gotten traction for many reasons.

The lack of easily accessible objective statistics is probably the biggest issue why this hasn't taken off but if you check you will find different rankings that seem subjective.

I don't have the link but I went over a couple of sets of offensive line rankings from last year and did not see any direct fantasy skill correlations and then I also noticed the rankings varied so there is some subjectivity and that makes sense because there aren't easily accessible objective statistics to rank offensive lines.