Player Rankings
Editor’s Note: This article is from a series of #FootClan guest posts highlighting what set Footballers rankings apart.
Player rankings are huge when it comes to setting your weekly fantasy lineup. Injuries, matchups, and past performance can leave your mind clustered at times, and leave you clueless with what to do with your roster. Player rankings are put in place to help ease the burden on the fantasy owner so you can use educated, yet unbiased opinions to help you put forward the best fantasy lineup possible.
When it comes to player rankings, no one in the business comes close to the quality rankings produced on a consistent basis by The Fantasy Footballers. Winning endless awards for fantasy player rankings and projections, the Footballers have earned their seat atop the throne of fantasy supremacy. Below we break down all that goes into the Footballers’ elaborate player rankings to see how they compile the best rankings in the market.
Player Rankings for all Scoring Formats
What better place to start than with the thing that matters the most in fantasy, the points. The Fantasy Footballers don’t give you one set of player rankings and tell you good luck. No, instead they offer up numerous weekly player rankings created specifically on the given scoring format of your choice. Check out some of the different types of player rankings available from The Fantasy Footballers below.
Standard vs. ½ Point PPR vs. Full PPR
With the expansion of scoring formats in fantasy football, we are now better able to reward players for their specific talents. Back in the day, a “scat-back” left little to no fantasy relevance, and that may still be the case when operating in a standard scoring league. I mean, how could he be relevant when he averages a grand total of four touts a game? The way this running back is viewed within fantasy player rankings can change dramatically if you then base his production off of PPR scoring. Player rankings can be night and day depending on the specific point setting selected.
Larry Centers was a hell of a fullback in his day, but the chances you would see his name atop running back player rankings in standard leagues were scarce to none. That’s because Centers operated more like a receiver. Lining up, up and down the formation, Centers was a focal point in his offense’s game plan. Centers averaged 100 receptions between 1995 and 1996, yet never eclipsed 116 carries in those two seasons. Players like Centers were virtually made for PPR scoring.
4-Point vs. 6-Point QB Scoring
The athletic QB was arguably at its peak back when Russell Wilson and RG3 took the league by storm as rookies. Once the NFL learned how to defend the read-option, the need for these mobile QBs dissipated. Yet quietly, over time the mobile quarterback has once again become relevant in the NFL, and now with more staying power.
This is great news for fantasy purposes, especially when considering player rankings in four point-QB leagues. These leagues do not give quarterbacks the normal six points when tossing a TD that other skill positions get for crossing the goal line. In return, player rankings in these scoring formats tend to favor QBs with the ability to score in other facets. A quarterback who possesses as a threat to score with his feet will often times rank higher in these player rankings than in rankings based off of six point-QB scoring especially when using tier-based drafting.
The Best of the Best
Chances are if you have Saquon Barkley on your roster, you’re playing him. Also, the chances of Saquon Barkley wavering any lower than the top 5-10 in positional player rankings on a given week is extremely unlikely. Players like Barkley are the few athletes that contain the abundance of talent needed to reach the hierarchy of football elitism. These players regularly sit atop player rankings week-in and week-out, regardless of how good, or bad a matchup may be.
While injuries might slightly shuffle their player rankings a spot or two here and there, the view point on these players remains the same. Just as long as they continue to warrant their standing amongst the elites, their player ranking stays high. The Footballers will likely rank these players atop their player rankings as long as they are active for game time. If they are active for game day, they should be active in your fantasy football lineup.
Attention to Trends
Not all players burst onto the NFL and fantasy scene. Instead, some gradually develop into liable fantasy options over time. Their NFL team slowly begins to integrate these players into their game plan. As they begin to show the ability to continuously produce with that opportunity, teams start to throw more and more playing time their way. The better they do, the more play they get. These players may not be known by the masses, but The Fantasy Footballers are certainly keeping tabs to help you better project when a player will officially “arrive.”
For example, early on in his rookie season, Tyreek Hill was perceived as nothing more than a return man and gadget player. This is understandable because initially, that was how he was used. Andy Reid used him in this way because he was getting Hill’s feet wet. HE wanted to see what Hill could do with the ball in his hand, and slowly increase his role over time.
After averaging 20.8 receiving yards per game in his first six contests of the season, Hill would explode for 98 yards and a touchdown the following week. Many “experts” perceived the performance as a fluke and added Hill to their “beware” or “do not buy” lists. Yet if they paid attention to the continued upward trend in Hill’s production and usage, they would have been warier of writing Hill off as a one-hit wonder. Find out more breakout fantasy players like Hill on a recent podcast.
This is where The Fantasy Footballers come in clutch. The Footballers take huge consideration into continued progress so you can find the next Tyreek Hill before someone else snatches him up. Check out Tyreek and others in the recent top-10 WR rankings for 2019 podcast.
Matchup Based Plays
The Fantasy Footballers always keep an eye on who’s coming to town this week. Player rankings can be highly reliant on a player’s matchup. If a middle of the pack QB is set to face off with the league’s top-ranked defense, the chances of him being a productive fantasy option that week are limited. In this instance, the quarterback’s fantasy player rankings will likely dip compared to the norm to better subside with his match.
Getty Images / Kevin C. Cox
Check out some late-round QBs worth targeting at the end of your drafts.
The Footballers also take a look at position-specific matchups and how a defense impacts those positions’ fantasy value. Within fantasy football, we could care less that Team A’s upcoming opposition hasn’t allowed a 100-yard rusher in six weeks when we don’t have Team A’s running back on our roster. However, we do care about how Team B’s defense does against the pass because we do roster Team A’s wideout. If their secondary has gotten scorched for 400+ yards passing in consecutive weeks, chances are that wide receiver is in for a big day, no matter what his teammate may do on the ground.
Player Usage Matters
Some fantasy owners tend to fall down a rabbit hole of perceiving name recognition and draft status as likely fantasy success, which is a faulty move at best. Instead, these owners should be looking at how a player is used, and how much a player is used within his offense. The Fantasy Footballers examine usage rates across the league to see which players offer the most bang for their buck.
For instance, take a look at Patriots running back James White. The former Wisconsin Badger has never started more than four games in any given season since entering the NFL in 2014. Yet White finished his 2018 campaign as the 7th highest scoring fantasy running back in PPR formats. White has built a name for himself in the NFL as a situational tailback who excels in the passing game. While he may never be a bell-cow back, his receiving prowess and high usage rate within the Patriots offense highly elevates him within fantasy player rankings.
Constantly Up to Date Player Rankings
Like everyone, you’re likely busy on a regular basis and just can’t keep up with fantasy football news the way you would like. This can sometimes lead to you making rash decisions when placing players in your lineup that better judgment would have warned you against. Players who were late scratches for a game, or who were projected to have their workload eaten into by another player at their position, are great examples of this. Don’t get stuck without of date player rankings when setting your lineups.
The Fantasy Footballers player rankings make it so you feel like you always have an ear to the fantasy world. Their player rankings are continuously altered based off of new incoming information. From breaking news stories to trades, injuries, and more, their rankings stay up to date. The Footballers’ constantly updated player rankings lead all the way up to kickoff, to produce the most efficient and realistic player rankings known to man.