Pick 1.12
8/6/10
Last month I wrote “Drafting
from the Middle,” a recap of a mock draft organized by
FF Toolbox that I participated in against peers in the industry.
That was the June edition in the three-part series of mock drafts,
with me drafting from the eighth pick.
Now I’m back to discuss the July edition mock draft, which
just finished. Based on random selection, I drew the eighth pick
in the draft, again. Fortunately I was able to plead my case that
no one wanted to read “Drafting from the Middle” again,
and RapidDraft’s
Matt Schauf graciously swapped draft positions with me, dropping
me down to the caboose, the end of the draft, the twelfth pick.
The setup is a 12-team league with standard performance plus PPR
scoring, 4 points for passing touchdowns and -1 for interceptions.
The starting lineup requires 1 QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, 1 TE, 1 Flex RB/WR/TE,
1 K and 1 DEF, and we’re drafting 18 roster spots.
Here is a recap of what happened, some thoughts on why I went in
a particular direction with the picks, and even an admitted mistake
and how I attempted to climb out of it. You may find this helpful
if you are drafting at the end of your draft, or close to it.
I sure wasn’t planning to end up with the same two picks to
start this draft as the last mock draft, although that is exactly
what happened. Except this time drafting twelfth instead of eighth
means I got a better deal (value) on Mendenhall and a worse deal
on Austin.
I almost went with the Jamaal Charles/Roddy White combination, which
is a great potential pair in its own right, but it would have been
only for the sake of drafting a little differently than last time.
I stuck to my guns and again took the highest available RB and WR
on my board.
The main concerns from the anti-Mendenhall crowd are (a) Pittsburgh’s
poor offensive line and (b) lack of explosiveness from Mendenhall.
My biggest concern is OC Bruce Arians, who ran the ball only 42
percent of the time last year and may have trouble adjusting his
propensity to pass, even without Ben Roethlisberger for the first
part of the season. I expect HC Mike Tomlin to force the issue,
to a degree, of running the ball more, and Mendy has little competition
for carries. The sky is not falling in Pittsburgh. This is still
going to be a good, competitive team. Mendenhall earned a healthy
4.6 YPC last year, and in a workhorse role this year, he’s
in line for top-10 RB numbers.
Other (strong) consideration:
Jamaal
Charles
Back in the June mock I took Austin as the sixth WR off the board.
This time only three were selected before this pick, yet I still
took Austin as my best bet at the position, passing on some big
names in Larry Fitzgerald and Calvin Johnson. I’m not concerned
with the anointed one (anointed by the fantasy community), Dez Bryant,
cutting into Austin’s numbers this year. Bryant is a rookie,
after all. Austin is in a great situation with a solid QB, a respected
running game, and good complimentary receivers. All of this will
help Austin to keep showing us what he showed us last year—that
he is one heck of a player.
Note: The Austin pick was made prior to Bryant’s injury
in training camp, so even at that point I still considered Austin
a great play for this season regardless of Bryant’s status.
Other consideration: Roddy
White
( Image courtesy of the Cheatsheet
Compiler & Draft Buddy... )
I don’t often take a QB this early in the draft, because usually
these top guys are getting drafted earlier than I feel their value
is worth. Well, not this time. Both the RB and WR positions are
getting into the so-so quality range; that is, they might be okay
but I’m not that excited about them in the 3rd round, and no TEs
are off the board yet. Meanwhile, Tony Romo and Tom Brady are making
their way towards me. I could really be a step ahead of the other
teams getting one of these top QB starters here. I may be better
served diversifying a bit by taking Brady instead of my second Cowboy,
but with the drafting of Austin it is clear I think highly of Romo
and expect him to have a great 2010 season.
Other consideration: Tom
Brady
People are shy on a repeat performance from Cedric Benson, but I’m
not sure why. I mean, I know he has that terrible history with the
Bears, but it may be the case that he just didn’t fit in with
that particular Bears team. Benson had an excellent 2009 campaign
from start to finish, and the Bengals are certainly gearing up as
if last year were no fluke. They’ve improved the passing game
by adding Terrell Owens as a serious threat opposite Chad Ochocinco,
which should help open up running lanes for Benson. He’s had
some off-season trouble (again), but he is currently in the clear
from that. At this point of the draft I’m happy to take 300+
carries at four yards per.
( Image courtesy of the Cheatsheet
Compiler & Draft Buddy... )
Choo-choo, here comes the hype train. Finley is getting a lot of
love from the fantasy community right now. The question is whether
it is justified or not. Well, he sure looks the part of a premier
pass-catching TE to me. In only 9 starts last year, and 13 games,
he hauled in 55 catches for 676 yards and 5 TDs, plus he had a monster
6-for-159 wild-card game against the Cardinals.
When the Packers started to utilize him more in the second half
of the season, he became the focal point of the offense. Watching
him play, he really passed the eye test as an emerging, dominant
force on the field. And considering he fell to the late 5th round,
he is worth the potential reward at this price.
I’m going off my board a little bit here, because FF Today’s Mike
Krueger doesn’t currently have Pierre
Garcon projected particularly high. Personally, I think Garcon
is in line for a very good season, assuming he wins the starting
job opposite Reggie Wayne. It isn’t a foregone conclusion, but I
wouldn’t draft him here unless I thought his odds were really good.
What I saw from Garcon last year was a player Peyton Manning felt
more comfortable going to as the season went on. He didn’t have
a high catch percentage, but that was due to his being on the other
end of more long plays downfield. With other options like T.J. Houshmandzadeh
and Santana Moss available, I’ll take the guy with more upside catching
passes from Manning.
I'm not a huge fan of Floyd, but it’s hard to deny the opportunity
that is falling into his lap with the continued grim holdout by
the (let’s not forget) suspended Vincent Jackson. Floyd did
have a mini–coming out party last year with 45-776-1, and
Philip Rivers showed more confidence in Floyd, which led to the
mid-season departure of Chris Chambers. With an expected increase
in targets and, one would think, more trips to the end zone, Floyd
becomes a viable upside WR3 choice here.
If Malcom Floyd is my longball guy with a handful of catches and
a gaudy yards per catch, Edelman is my anti-Floyd: many catches
and a struggle to get over 10 yards per catch. But those receptions
sure add up! Maybe I'm a pessimist, but I don't see Vincent Jackson
in the Chargers’ future, and I just don't see a positive outlook
for Wes Welker at this point, which opens the door for Edelman to
continue in the role he admirably filled late last season. I double
up at WR with these last two picks, given that RB was more of a
strength for me in the early rounds.
Sidebar: I’ll admit it,
I made a mistake in the last pair of picks, and that mistake really
has little to do with the news
of Welker coming off the PUP since these picks were made—and
since the comment about little positive outlook for Welker was written.
It has to do with taking two risky WRs and waiting (and hoping)
through another 22 picks for a good RB to come back to me. That
was too much to hope for, and I should have taken a solid third
RB with one of those picks.
Drafting from an end spot, you may find yourself in a position where
you need to reach a bit for a player you need or really want. If
you refuse to reach a bit, then the long turn can be damaging, not
only taking away the player you wanted, but wiping out a host of
similarly talented players, leaving you scrambling to fix the hole
in your roster.
We’ve heard this song before. In an aging Patriots backfield,
Maroney (twenty-five years old) is the young, talented RB who must
be ready to earn more touches over Sammy Morris (thirty-three),
Fred Taylor (thirty-four), and Kevin Faulk (thirty-four). Seriously,
this is the year, right?…Right? Maybe...
Once again the Pats did not draft a running back or acquire a big-name
guy as a free agent or via trade. As a team, they do rack up the
rushing stats with quiet efficiency. While no one, myself included,
is convinced the team will show enough confidence in Maroney to
make him overly and consistently fantasy relevant, he has the best
opportunity among the available choices to do it. He did have a
great run last year from Weeks 6 through 12, when members of the
geriatric crew were dinged up, and this time around they are all
a year older…
Mason brings some balance to the high-risk WR crew I accumulated
through the first eight rounds. While Edelman and Floyd—and
even Garcon, for that matter—have some excellent upside, they
all have some question marks in terms of camp competition and lack
of experience. Mason has boatloads of experience, and I don’t
think it is a foregone conclusion Joe Flacco will exclusively target
newly acquired Anquan Boldin as often as people think, which has
caused Boldin to get drafted on average in the third round of fantasy
drafts. Flacco knows what he has in Mason, and he knows he can rely
on him. With three consecutive seasons of over 1,000 yards, Mason
isn’t going to completely fall of the cliff, and he should
be, at minimum, a reliable early-season starter.
Sidebar: This is me attempting
to correct the earlier mistake in the 7th/8th rounds of taking on
too much risk at one position (WR) and passing on a good third RB.
I’ve already secured a top QB and top TE early, so at this
point of the draft I picked the next best RB available, along with
a more conservative, reliable WR. Going forward, I’m going
to try to stockpile those positions as best I can to build quality
depth.
The starting RB job in Chicago appears to be Matt Forte’s
to lose, but Chester Taylor is a talented RB in his own right. Taylor
is going to put some pressure on Forte in this new (to the Bears)
and complicated Mike Martz offense. Both backs are good pass catchers,
but perhaps Taylor’s experience and good pass blocking will
give him an edge picking up the offense and get him on the field
if he can better protect Jay Cutler. As we know, every QB under
Martz needs an exceptional amount of pass protection. Considering
that the Bears shelled out good coin to bring in Taylor as a free
agent, one can reason they expect to use him in a larger role than
the occasional change-of-pace back. Sure, that is pure speculation,
but the same type of speculation comes with nearly every RB at this
stage of the draft.
With only minor consideration to pull the first defense off the
board or back up Tony Romo, I really want to take two RBs with this
pair of picks to bolster my RB depth. I almost pick Willis McGahee
right behind Chester Taylor, each back offering exceptional upside
if their team’s starter goes down. However, I notice Bernard
Scott is still available and feel that, since I have Cedric Benson
already, I shouldn’t mess around and better insure Benson
at this point.
Scott is a young, talented player just waiting in the wings for
his opportunity to show what he can do. He is a pure handcuff. Benson
did have a lot of carries a year ago, and is sure to take a pounding
in the black-and-blue division of the AFC North, so better I grab
Scott now instead of giving every other team another chance at him
before my next set of picks.
I waited a good long time to take my backup QB. But after my last
pair of picks, Matt Cassel, Jason Campbell, and David Garrard were
still on the board, and there was a good chance I could get one
of these preferred three next time around. Campbell is nothing to
write home about in terms of ability to put up big passing numbers,
but he is entrenched as the starter and should have a decent opportunity
to air it out in quite a few games. Given the prior state of the
Raiders QB situation, Campbell is a welcome addition to a team that
may just overachieve a little this year as a final parting gift
for JaMarcus Russell.
While the likelihood of earning much fantasy success on the back
of any Cleveland Browns player is a tough proposition, I can’t help
but consider new QB Jake Delhomme’s past contributions in helping
to develop star wide receivers. Steve Smith is the obvious reference
point, but let’s not forget Muhsin Muhammad circa 2004 when Smith
played just one game. Bottom line is, regardless of the interceptions,
Delhomme is not afraid to force the ball to his primary receiver.
Massaquoi saw 95 targets a year ago. If that number climbs north
of 130, with a little better catch ratio in his second year, Massaquoi
might pleasantly surprise owners with his year-end numbers.
A seventh WR might seem like overkill at this point, but I don’t
envision rostering two defenses or two kickers, and none of the
defenses stand out as being worth drafting right now. The Cowboys
would have been the pick had they lasted. So, more depth is the
order of the day. Walter is worth a shot this late in the draft,
playing in a prolific offense and not far removed from a 60-899-8
season in 2008, before dropping to 53-611-2 last year. I don’t
put much stock in the idea that Jacoby Jones will earn the starting
spot over Walter, considering the team has given Jones plenty of
chances he hasn’t cashed in on yet.
Scheffler represents a decent flier pick in fantasy drafts this
year, particularly considering that many people think (or thought)
Brandon Pettigrew was in line to be the main pass-catching TE this
season, building off his rookie year cut short by injury. Ah, but
recovery is not going as well as hoped for Pettigrew, and the Lions
brought in Scheffler, who plays TE but can’t block worth a
damn. He’s there to catch passes. Scheffler was forgotten
by the Broncos a year ago but flashed some talent prior to that.
Let’s see what the new surroundings, even if it is Detroit,
can do for him.
I was targeting the Cincinnati Bengals but they surprisingly got
nabbed earlier this round. The Colts defense is an okay but not
a great choice for reliable fantasy stats. More than likely I’d
be scanning the waiver wire in this league for a surprise defense
or to play matchups against weak, error-prone opponents.
Even in a tough division, the Dolphins are in line for a good season.
Carpenter is a young guy, especially for a kicker, but he hasn’t
missed a beat in his first two seasons. He hit 89 percent of his
field goal tries last year. Keep him in mind as an unheralded, late-round
kicker after the bigger names are off the board.
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