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Mike Vick could be a value play in 2012 fantasy drafts
by Matt Schauf
Looking for a good investment for your fantasy draft dollar? Check out the rookie WRs.
I’m not specifically advocating this year’s crop. Not even getting into the particular candidates for 2012. The fact is, when you compare price vs. return on 1st-year wideouts over the past 5 years, targeting the group has simply proved a good idea.
From 2007 through 2011, only 17 rookie WRs showed up in the final “standard-scoring” ADP list at FF Calculator. That was just 5% of the 334 WRs overall, meaning fantasy owners don’t trust the new guys. Yet, of those 17, only 2 who were drafted among the top-50 at their position finished the season outside that range. That means those who drafted rookie WRs wound up getting good value.
Let’s start with the relative failures … because even they weren’t all that bad. Michael Crabtree obviously let down everyone in 2009, ranking 60th (PPR) and 61st (non) in total points. Once he finally decided to show up, though, he delivered the 37th and 38th best per-game averages among WRs. Patient owners wound up getting a decent return on the guy whose ADP ranked 46th among WRs.
Anthony Gonzalez also missed a few games in his rookie campaign (apparently because he’s made of toothpicks and Elmer’s). Fantasy owners probably overrated his draft position and offense anyway. Gonzalez’s ADP was WR46. He finished no better than 60th across formats. Even then, Gonzalez was merely a mid-11th round pick. That’s hardly true bust territory.
And those were the 2 biggest misses. The rest of the group hasn’t carried much downside. Only 6 of the 17 aforementioned rookies finished lower than their ADPs. We’ve already addressed Crabtree and Gonzalez. The others:
– Dez Bryant was drafted in fantasy-starter range in 2010 (ADP: WR31) but lost 4 games to injury. He still finished 38th (standard) and 42nd (PPR) in fantasy points per game. That’s not too far from expectations, especially considering he played through an ankle sprain.
– Calvin Johnson missed just 1 game as a 2007 rookie but played much of the season with a back injury. We can’t really know how much it affected him, but it didn’t take a scout to see some impact. He still finished just outside starter range — 39th (standard), 38th (PPR) — but couldn’t quite live up to his WR19 ADP.
– James Jones (51) and Ted Ginn (55) each got drafted outside the position’s top-50 in 2007, so their owners suffered no big loss. Jones checked in at 59th (standard) and 58th (PPR) thanks to a low TD tally, while Ginn was nowhere near useful. Anyone who found himself shocked by Ginn disappointing, though, wasn’t paying attention beforehand.
As you can see, the “bad” wasn’t even all that bad the past 5 years. The good, on the other hand, has been quite good. Most recently, A.J. Green far exceeded draft expectations at the top of the 2011 class. He came off the board as the 36th WR and finished no lower than 17th across scoring formats. Julio Jones dealt with a frustrating hamstring injury but still used a late-season explosion to outperform his WR26 ADP. Greg Little finished right about where his WR52 ADP started things. Meanwhile, Torrey Smith, Doug Baldwin, Denarius Moore, and Titus Young produced well beyond their ADPs.
2010 wasn’t deep, but fantasy owners didn’t expect it to be. Only 2 rookies showed up among the 75 WRs on FF Calculator’s ADP list. Bryant we know about. The other, Tampa Mike Williams, delivered a spot-on Michael Clayton impression. He parlayed a WR47 ADP into a top-12 finish in standard formats (16th in PPR).
The class before that was loaded — not surprising from an NFL draft with 6 Round 1 WRs. Only Percy Harvin checked in with a higher ADP than Crabtree’s. He finished the season 10 spots ahead of his WR35 draft position. Classmates Austin Collie, Hakeem Nicks, Mike Wallace, and Jeremy Maclin all joined Harvin in fantasy-starter range. Kenny Britt added useful patches, and even Mohamed Massaquoi wasn’t totally irrelevant (unlike the 2 years since).
2008 featured Eddie Royal and DeSean Jackson outperforming their ADPs, while undrafted Donnie Avery performed near fringe-starter range. And no wideout graced the 1st-round of the NFL draft that year. Despite the relative underperformers of 2007, Dwayne Bowe led that class as a solid WR2 in 12-team leagues.
That year was the end of the reliable ADP numbers in my research, but it certainly did not mark the beginning of productive rooks. Marques Colston’s bust out came in 2006. The notorious Clayton ruled 2004, with Lee Evans, Roy Williams, Larry Fitzgerald, and Keary Colbert also delivering starter value. 2003 introduced us to Anquan Boldin and Andre Johnson, who ranked 5th and 23rd respectively in standard leagues.
Overall, 18 rookie WRs have finished among the PPR top-50 since 2007. Standard formats saw 20 land in that range. That’s 4 per season. And the rates increased over the past 3 years (13 and 15, respectively). From 2009 through 2011, rookies made up just 5% of standard WR ADP lists but 10% of the top-50 scorers.
Nearly all of these players were guys you could have drafted as 3rd, 4th or 5th fantasy WRs — or even claimed off waivers during the season. The takeaway here is that you shouldn’t be hesitant to fill a bench slot with an unknown just because Deion Branch looks a little more comfy. We’ll go into greater detail on the 2012 crop of newcomers and their outlooks as the NFL draft comes and goes.
Haley vs. Roethlisberger in the Steel cage
I’m quite intrigued by this Todd Haley-Ben Roethlisberger relationship, and not only because it’s headed toward an inevitable helmet-less motorcycle joust.
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