There is almost no worse feeling in fantasy football than to see one of your early-round draft picks run into a mascot and wreck his knee in the month of September. One feeling that IS worse, however, is to see another stud you own get carted off the field the very next week. Your #1 running back (Jamaal Charles - 1st Rd), gone for the year. #1 receiver (Kenny Britt - 4th Rd) - same fate.
Unfortunately, both injuries happened early in their respective games and I lost those weeks partially due to their minimal opportunities. The other primary reason I lost was a deficiency at tight end. I scored 3 points with my TE the first three weeks combined.
The one position that I had excellent depth was quarterback. I took Aaron Rodgers with my 2nd round pick - ecstatic that he was still available at that point. I also was lucky enough to get both Matthew Stafford late and Josh Freeman, who was still available in the next-to-last round. I needed to make a move.
I had good depth at both RB and WR, but I was worried that I didn't have a true #1 anymore. Some of my other high picks (Frank Gore & Dwayne Bowe) had disappeared at least two of the three weeks and did not look like they could be counted on to carry my team. I knew to have any real shot at coming back - I needed to make a big move. I knew I would not be able to get equal value for Stafford. Although I think he will perform close to Rodgers most weeks - and through three weeks, he had outscored Rodgers - he would not bring the same return that Rodgers would. I decided I would try and trade Rodgers for a top-flight RB or WR. The only problem was, the only teams that had a need for a QB did not have anyone I wanted. I briefly discussed Rodgers for Ray Rice but was quickly shot down. I also proposed Rodgers for Jones-Drew but was rejected. Those were the only two RB I felt would outscore my current backs enough to make a trade worth it. I had two choices - I could keep my roster intact, wasting one top 5 QB every week on my bench or I could go for broke.
The movie "Moneyball", though not entirely true to the book and the premise, delves into taking advantage of "market inefficiencies". In it's simplest form, it is when current prices do not reflect actual or future value to the organization or the actual information. A better reference point is the book "The Extra 2%" by Jonah Keri which is also about finding gains in players other organizations undervalue but in broader terms, describes how the Tampa Bay Rays used ANY imbalance or advantage they could to gain even the slightest edge. I decided I would look to take advantage of a market inefficiency. I would also use basic math to find arbitrage in a deal.
Rob Gronkowski of the Patriots was the #1 TE by a margin of 20 points through three weeks. He had been consistently targeted and effective for a top offense that loves to throw the ball. He also plays for a coach that when he finds a strength will continue to use it to his advantage - the two-TE setup along with Wes Welker in the slot is very difficult to cover for most of today's defensive schemes and his targets had increased three consecutive weeks. "Gronk" had outscored my TEs by 13, 20 and 22 the first three weeks. Rodgers overall had been outscored by Stafford by four points. If I had Gronkowski in my lineup and had used Stafford all three games instead of Rodgers, my record would be 2-0-1 instead of 1-2. By trading Rodgers for Gronkowski, I was causing a NET GAIN in my points each week. Was it risky? Absolutely. Could it backfire? Yes, but by outscoring the AVERAGE TE by nine points every week and not losing any points by switching quarterbacks, Gronkowski was considerably more valuable to MY team than Rodgers at the time.
I know some may look at this and say, "Well, that's a small sample size and Stafford won't outscore Rodgers the rest of the way. Look at what Rodgers did this Sunday!" That may be fair, but how much will he outscore him by on an AVERAGE week. Sunday's game was a freak occurrence. Nobody will score 48 points consistently. Even taking into account the outlier game that Rodgers had, he has outscored Stafford by an average of seven points. If, for the rest of the season that holds true (it will more likely be 3-4 points/week) and Gronkowski averages 12 points per game which was 10 more than my current waiver wire TE strategy, I have still made a trade that improved my team in two ways. I have increased my net average total per week AND have a larger advantage at a specific position over my opponent. Just like the stocks, past performance is not an indicator of future results and that bore fruit this week when Gronkowski was shut down by the Raiders and Rodgers had a career game against the Broncos. That'll happen, but due to the injuries to my star players, I felt by staying put I guaranteed myself no shot at the playoffs - I had to think outside the box and I still like the trade I made.
Statistics from ESPN were used in this post as well as general information from Moneyball and The Extra 2%. If you only read one of these books (you should read both), read the latter.
No comments:
Post a Comment