ConnSKINS26
Footballguy
And his QB loves him--and he's given him good reason to trust him in big situations.
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Dynasty Rankings (13 Viewers)
- Thread starter Fear & Loathing
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
ZWK
Footballguy
What Coop said. When I ran the numbers on this a few years back, I think it looked like first year WR breakouts were about as common as 2nd year breakouts, or 3rd year breakouts (and breakouts became much rarer after that). The average career VBD of WRs who didn't break out as rookies is probably something like 75% of the average career VBD of all WRs.
And urgency doesn't help you much here, at least on average. The chance of a WR-who-hasn't-broken-out-yet breaking out this year is about the same in year 1 as it is in year 2 or 3 (although I'm actually not sure if that's true for mid-round WRs - their chances of breaking in may go up a little). Guys who are stuck down the depth chart are a special case, but that is less of an issue at WR than at other positions. It was not an issue with Wheaton - Jerricho Cotchery is no Jason Witten.
Adam Harstad
Moderator
I'd go one further and add Tavon Austin to this group. I think all three rookies have a pretty similar profile. All three are very unique prospects with freakish athleticism and no great historical comps. All three were top-40 picks. All three made some ludicrous, jaw-dropping big plays against NFL competition (Hunter high-pointing that deep ball, Patterson's ridiculous rushing TD in the Baltimore scorefest, Austin reversing field and rushing for another 50+ yard score two games after his breakout game- just to give one example for each). All three struggled to get on the field at times. All three put up comparable per-game production.
Adam Harstad
Moderator
Yeah, I was just giving a reason why a player's value could rise despite a disappointing season, not suggesting that reason was appropriate in the current circumstances. Personally, I could see an argument for moving Escobar and McDonald up from last year's ranking, simply because they're one year closer to starting (actually, the same could be said of all rookie TEs, since rookie TEs are notorious for struggling out the gate). If they got a bump, it shouldn't be a big one. I could see an argument for moving Ball up from last offseason, too, as our expectations change for the entire Denver offense. In theory, Michael is one season closer to starting and should be in line for a small bump, though it seems he received a big one, instead. For guys like Wheaton, though, I don't see the reasoning for having them higher today than they were 6 months ago.
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
I'd move him instantly for a top 6 pick. I'd instantly pay the 2.1 for him. Somewhere between those spots; 1.09-1.11ish.
JFS171
Footballguy
To clarify, you guys don't hold a rookie year against a guy who was either stuck behind a veteran great (Escobar behind Witten in a position where 1 guy is generally the lead guy). Whereas it's more of a black mark for a relatively healthy Wheaton that still sat behind guys like Cotchery.
How does that apply to guys that struggled with injuries though? Do they get a complete pass? Thinking about a guy like Patton, who was injured during camp, then started to finally break out only to get injured again. By the time he got back, he's behind Boldin and Crabtree.
Or a guy like Boyce who missed so much time in the offseason, then was behind all season... finally started to really break out late in the season, only to get hurt once again. I couldn't help but watch all those passes in the Pats/Denver game going to Austin Collie and thinking how much more explosive and effective Boyce would have been with those targets.
In other words, where do we draw the line... how do we ID the guys that just haven't broken out yet vs. the guys that never will? How do we separate the Cecil Shorts of the world from the Jonathan Baldwins?
Adam Harstad
Moderator
I tend to be very forgiving of all injured players. Injuries are a fact of life in the NFL, and the vast majority of them are just random chance rather than an indicator of any underlying issue. If a guy struggled because he was injured, he gets a pass and my expectations afterwards remain the same as they were before.
There's no way to reliably separate the guys who haven't broken out from the guys who never will, I think the key is just managing expectations. Should we have realistically expected Gavin Escobar to have broken out last season? And if not, should we penalize him for the fact that he didn't? Guys like Austin, Patterson, and Hunter performed pretty much right within my range of expectations for them- raw, sometimes struggling to get on the field, flashing the ability to make plays no one else in the league could make. As a result, their value remained pretty static. Someone like Wheaton underperformed my expectations. I didn't expect him to light the league on fire, but beating out Jerricho Cotchery would have been nice. As a result, he gets downgraded. Since he's a rookie and rookies often take time to acclimate, it's a slight downgrade.
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Dr. Octopus
Footballguy
Adam Harstad
Moderator
The new OC was Washington's TE coach last season. I'm assuming his promotion has at least something to do with his work with Reed.Dr. Octopus said:
az_prof
Footballguy
I didn't see the same "wow" factor from Austin as Hunter or Patterson. He seems more like a possession receiver.
Dr. Octopus
Footballguy
Coeur de Lion
Footballguy
bicycle_seat_sniffer
Smells like chicken
if there is one thing austin didnt lack was a wow factor.
kids a home run hitter. if anything he probably needs to work on his possession WR skills, route running, etc.
Concept Coop
Footballguy
It's the possession stuff Austin needs to work on. The big plays will come, and did, in spurts.
Adam Harstad
Moderator
Watch his punt return against Indianapolis and his rushing TD against Chicago. Plenty of "wow" there. Also, his third touchdown against Indy doesn't look that impressive on first viewing, but it really showcases his ridiculous speed. He barely looks like he's exerting himself and he leaves Indianapolis in his dust. By far his most impressive play, though, was the play that ended his season- his 56 yard run at the end of the 3rd quarter against Arizona. He didn't get a lot of blocking support on that one, but he juked several Arizona defenders out of their shoes and basically just weaved his way through one of the best defenses in the entire NFL.
Tavon Austin is small, inconsistent, and unreliable. He's also the biggest threat to turn any routine play into a 50-yard gain since Chris Johnson at his peak. Over his last 3.75 games of the year, he had 346 yards, 3 TDs, and four 50+ yarders on offense (on just 13 touches), plus that 90+ yard punt return for another TD on special teams. Austin has "wow" in spades. I just wish he had a lot more of the "ho-hum" to go with it.
EBF
Footballguy
Austin is an absolute squirt. I don't know if a 5'8" 175 pound WR is ever going to have the volume or durability to dominate in the NFL, but at WR3 prices I don't think he's a terrible gamble to take. DLF has Austin at WR33. At that price, there's not a huge downside to swinging and missing.
Adam Harstad
Moderator
Concept Coop
Footballguy
EBF
Footballguy
Yea, there's a precedent, but up until this season Jackson had never really been a featured WR. His career high in receptions after five seasons was 62 catches. They also have very different playing styles, with Jackson historically being more of an outside deep threat and Austin being more of a joker.
He's actually a lot smaller than Welker. People don't realize how stocky Welker is:
Welker - 5'8.75" 195 (29.0 BMI)
Austin - 5'8.5" 174 (26.1 BMI)
To put those numbers into perspective, Welker's height/weight ratio is greater than Vincent Jackson, Dez Bryant, and Larry Fitzgerald. A typical big WR will be right around 27.5-29. Anything over that is more in line with what you usually see from a TE or a RB. Austin's 26.1 would be right near the bottom of the scale if you were to look at successful receivers in the league right now. DeSean Jackson is quite a bit smaller with a 24.4. AJ Green is down near the bottom at 25.9 (though he's 6'3"+ to help compensate). It's probably worth noting that those guys are used primarily as outside receivers running downfield, so they're likely not as exposed to violent hits across the middle as someone like Welker. That isn't Austin's game at all. He's more of a slot weapon than a conventional outside WR.
If you look at the FF-relevant players in that role, you get a pretty short list of Harvin, Cobb, and Welker. With a 21 pound advantage at basically the same exact height, you can see how Welker is a bad comparison from a physique standpoint. Harvin and Cobb are a little better. At 5'10.25" and 192 pounds, Cobb has a 27.4 BMI. At 5'11.125" 192 pounds, Harvin has a 26.7 BMI. A few things stand out to me here. The first is that, despite having only moderately higher BMI figures, both of those guys are almost 20 pounds heavier than Austin. The second is that both of those guys have already suffered some serious injuries. While it's too early to tell the story of their careers, it's possible that their thin frames combined with their usage as hit magnets over the middle will result in long term durability issues. I'd also point out that while BMI tells you a lot about a player's body type, "bigger" is still better in the sense that a taller version of the same body type will usually have more strength and power (i.e. Darren Sproles vs. Steven Jackson/Adrian Peterson -- Sproles is actually "thicker" from a BMI standpoint). That doesn't bode well for someone who's both thin and really short like Austin.
Add it all up and I think you've got to question the conventional wisdom that Austin is well-equipped to handle a high volume slot role. I rated him pretty high out of college because of his draft slot and speed, but I also urged caution because of how atypical his game was. This scouting report from CFN last year really struck a chord with me and I think might be the most accurate take on his skill set:
Adam Harstad
Moderator
Yeah, there really aren't any great historical comps for Tavon Austin. Very, very few receivers enter the league who are anywhere near his size. It'd be crazy for one of them to go even in the first three rounds, and yet Tavon Austin went in the top 10 picks. It'd be like if an NFL franchise took a 5'10" quarterback with the #1 overall. Or drafted a 275 pound offensive lineman in the top 5. There are few enough short quarterbacks or light linemen in the league to make a comp, and the ones there are almost always fell because of concerns over their size. If a player that atypical gets drafted that high, it tells me that teams must LOVE everything else about his game to overlook that glaring concern.
Patterson and Hunter have the same thing in their favor. There are few enough receivers in the league whose college resumes were that thin. There are fewer still who were drafted in the top 40 picks. For NFL franchises to take a chance on them so high despite such a glaring concern, they must bring an awful lot to the table.
EBF
Footballguy
Hunter was a 1000+ yard receiver in the SEC. Patterson is a slightly different case because he was a JUCO transfer who skipped college after one season. Not a lot of those floating around. At least with him there's prototypical height/weight for the team to fall back on.
As far as the draft slot goes, it's the main reason why I had Austin as a tier one prospect. Based on the eyeball test and my own subjective opinion, I would not rate him that highly. Draft position is important, but even ~50% of first round picks bust. Ted Ginn, Darrius Heyward-Bey, and Troy Williamson were top 10 picks at WR. Teams make mistakes every season. Based on random odds alone, he's probably a coin flip to become a really strong FF contributor.
It's also worth pointing out that while there's a pretty strong link between NFL draft position and FF success, teams aren't ultimately drafting players based on their FF potential. If the Rams think Austin will be electric with 100 targets, 30 carries, and a handful of punt returns, that might be enough for them to rate him as a top 10 value even if they don't see him as workhorse type of receiver.
For a WR3 price in a startup draft, I wouldn't knock someone for taking Austin. Based on his diminutive frame, I'll be surprised if he's ever more than a glorified gadget player though. As far as top 10 WR picks in the NFL draft go, I think he's on the "meh" end of the spectrum.
Listed heights/weights on the web are pretty unreliable. That's why it's best to go with the combine numbers whenever possible.
DraftScout has Welker at 5'8.75" 195, so I'm going to assume that's what he measured at.
The "he's going to gain weight" thing is something that people fall back on all the time when trying to justify their optimism for a player they already like. If you're going to assume that one player is going to gain weight after entering the league, shouldn't you also assume that a lot of the other players will gain weight too? Thus what qualifies as "small" at the combine is likely to still qualify as "small" at peak development when all of the other players have also maxed out.
I'm not a huge fan of the "he's going to gain weight" line of reasoning. It's self-serving. Beyond that, Austin was a four year college player at a major university. He's probably pretty close to maxed out physically. By the time you're 22-23, I'm assuming your body type is pretty well set and that you're not going to naturally undergo any type of radical transformation. There might be exceptions here and there, but I can't think of too many.
And Austin doesn't have the excuse of being a track guy, a basketball player, or some other type of athlete who wouldn't have been living in the weight room in college.
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
This is where so many of these new metrics fail. In order for your metric to matter, you need to be able to display that the market (NFL or ADP) is consistently wrong and that your new metric can correct it. So many of these metrics treat a lack of historical comps as evidence that a model can’t work or succeed.
Your examples are perfect. Anyone can do a quick study that shows sub 300lb lineman are rare in the NLF and don’t perform as well, on average, as bigger ones. That means nothing unless you can prove that sub 300lb linemen fail more than bigger guys drafted in the same range.
Another easy example; 5* recruits have better NFL careers on average than 4* recruits. But that stops mattering long before we pick these guys in our fantasy drafts. The only way for it to matter is to show that 5* recruits are more successful than 4* recruits drafted in the same range.
That’s why Tavon is tricky, and you’re 100% right: The NFL knows Tavon is smaller than past WRs who have performed. They still treated him as a top 10 prospect. At this point, until we can show that 5’8” 175 lb WRs drafted in the top 10 fail more than the average top 10 pick, Tavon is a question mark. It’s likely more sound to treat him as a generic top 10 NFL pick than a generic 175 pound WR.
[SIZE=medium]Pardon my tangent, but I’ve been a little annoyed (for lack of a better term) by the countless metrics being waved in front our faces that lack this very simple, very essential understanding. [/SIZE]
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
Granted, it's absolutely sound logic to be concerned about a guy of his size holding up in the NFL. That's where we have to separate our needs from the needs of the NFL market. If Tavon can be one of the better return guys in the league and add another dimension to the offense, he might prove worthy of a top 10 NFL pick, while not being worthy of the fantasy equivalent of it. Blackmon, Floyd, and other bigger top 10 picks are absolutely safer fantasy picks, despite the NFL valuing Tavon on par with them. We don't get points for return yardarge and it doesn't matter if Tavon opens things up for his teammates by stretching the defense. We're looking for raw production measured in receptions, yardage, and scores. The NFL is looking for wins and losses.
Patterson is another guy whose NFL draft position we might want to adjust for. He could repeat his rookie year production for 5 years and be worth the pick the Vikings spent on him. His fantasy owners would be obviously disappointed, however.
Patterson is another guy whose NFL draft position we might want to adjust for. He could repeat his rookie year production for 5 years and be worth the pick the Vikings spent on him. His fantasy owners would be obviously disappointed, however.
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EBF
Footballguy
I think you also have to ask why the league displays certain types of preferences. For example, why does the NBA never draft anyone below 6'8" to play center? Because height is important for success at the position. If you put a 6'4" guy out there against NBA caliber centers, he would get eaten alive.
What you are saying is that in a hypothetical situation where there was a 6'4" center prospect who was so impressive and so dominant that NBA teams valued him as a lottery pick despite his obvious flaw, he should be viewed as having the same odds of success as a random center prospect picked in the same range.
I understand that perspective, but a flaw is a flaw. All else being equal, a 6'4" center will never have the success of a 7'1" center. I'm a big believer that function follows form and that the requirements of a given position effectively select the certain specific body types and skill sets capable of performing the position's duties at a high level. That's why at the high levels of football, the players all start to look the same. You notice this when you go from watching high school ---> NCAA ---> NFL ---> Pro Bowl. At each level the players move closer to the archetype for their respective position/role. You see a lot of strange looking players in a high school game, but you don't see a 6'4" 180 pound RB in the NFL because anyone that size would be broken in half. You don't see a 5'6" DE because nobody that short could beat an OT. As of right now, we've yet to see a 5'8" 175 pound target machine at WR.
Why is that? Not because there are no good athletes that size. It's because that size is not well-equipped to meet the job description of a workhorse NFL WR. With a player that small, you have to question whether or not he can make any impact in contested situations and whether or not he can take a hit. The obvious rebuttal is that his elite speed and burst will compensate for his shortcomings in other facets of the game. There haven't been any WRs with Tavon Austin's size who were as highly-regarded as Tavon Austin, therefore you can't compare him to those players but only other players who were as highly-regarded (regardless of their size).
I buy that to a point, but only to a point. Innate physical restrictions are going to play a role in determining every player's ceiling. Since nobody with Austin's dimensions has ever become a dominant NFL WR, it's possible that Austin's dimensions won't allow him to become a dominant NFL WR and that the Rams simply made a bad pick by overrating his positives and underrating his negatives. Teams do that all the time. And like I said earlier, they did not draft him for his FF value. Devin Hester has been totally useless as an FF asset, but as an NFL player you'd have to say that he was a pretty good draft pick.
Sometimes I think people mistakenly look at a player's draft position and assume that because he was picked in a certain slot, the team views him a certain way. For example, Marqise Goodwin was picked in the same range as many prolific NFL WRs. Therefore the Bills believe Marqise Goodwin can be a prolific NFL WR. Seems to make sense on the surface, but perhaps not. Maybe they don't think Goodwin will ever be more than a #3, but they think his dynamic speed and big play ability will add so much value to their offense that it justifies a high pick.
What I'm trying to say is that even though the Rams took Austin in the same range as Julio Jones, Justin Blackmon, and Michael Crabtree, that doesn't automatically mean they think he's a comparable WR talent. Could be that they see him as a low-volume gamebreaker whose 800 total yards of offense and dynamic punt returns will help them win a lot of NFL games. Ultimately they are not drafting based on a player's likelihood of putting up raw FF stats, which is where we differ.
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
ShaHBucks
Footballguy
It's only impossible because you guys value draft position so much when it has the smallest impact, if any, of what a individual needs to succeed at a high level in the NFL. Austin is not a rare commodity like I've said from the jump. There are plenty of other small/fast/quick WRs in league, so the NFL was completely off in valuing him so high from a supply and demand standpoint. My few cents
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
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ShaHBucks
Footballguy
Show me why draft position matters when they are on the field.
Concept Coop
Footballguy
Draft position matters because the NFL Draft is the best market we have for measuring how a college player will perform in the NFL. It accounts for everything that goes into a player performing at that level. It's not perfect, but it's the best.
ETA: Vegas isn't perfect, but if you ever try to market your ability to predict the outcome of sporting events, you're not getting anywhere without measuring your results against the spread, the current standard. The NFL draft (unadjusted) and ADP (adjusted) are the current standards, which any study aimed at predicting fantasy success has to be measured against to be of any value. Otherwise, it's just noise.
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
NFL teams. STL had to trade up to grab him. He wasn't a reach at all, in that regard.
NFL teams are playing NFL football not fantasy football.... Tavon returns punts..... Oh- how great is that.... Yay...
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ShaHBucks
Footballguy
Back to comparing him to Julio Jones I guess
This is why you don't let your personal fantasy draft board get skewed by what NFL teams draft. Remember they are drafting for the best NFL player (special teams included). Also there is a lot of ineptitude and nepotism in NFL front offices. Trusting the so-called professionals is not always the right answer. I would rather "trust my own swing" and use my own judgement.
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Concept Coop
Footballguy
It's one thing to trust your own swing, but another to use hindsight and a small sample size to draft absolutes.
Concept coop I need your interpretation to help me understand what you are trying to say here....
Concept Coop
Footballguy
Professional fantasy writers had Austin higher in their ratings too, more often than not. Yay...
Concept Coop
Footballguy
You are thumping your chest because Tavon didn't live up to his rookie year expectations. You are now pointing to his height as the reason, and suggesting it's a rule. I don't see that wise or productive. Tavon Austin flashed plenty enough to suggest that he could still be everything he was drafted to be--by the Rams and his fantasy owners.
Trust your own swing. I did not!
I took Hunter in both of my rookie drafts and traded down specifically with that in mind. I saw and smelled value. There was NO VALUE in drafting Austin high...
You ran off the cliff with the rest of the monkeys if you drafted Austin high....
Concept Coop
Footballguy
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I would think that Hunter has more dynasty value right now. Why? He is 6 foot 4 and has Olympic speed and jumping ability....
Size and speed combo cannot be taught or bought....
Concept Coop
Footballguy
A few years ago I used the same logic to draft Baldwin over Cobb. I like to think I've learned from that mistake. I'm sure you will too.
