College Fantasy Info

Boston College and Matt Ryan

I have really hated Boston College all season. Gave them zero chance to win at Virginia Tech. For the majority of Boston College's battle against the Hokies, I appeared to be right. Then Ryan led BC to two Heisman-quality scoring drives. If Matt Ryan wins the Heisman Trophy, and everyone seems ready to engrave the trophy now, those touchdown passes will be replayed over and over and over. Two questions that immediately pop into my head:

Is Boston College worthy of the #2 ranking?
In a season where everyone is falling and top-ranked upsets are happening weekly, kudos have to be given to Boston College for winning this game. Even when they were playing awful football, they were still in the football game the entire way. Boston College is very similar to the top-ranked Buckeyes. In fact, there probably should be some debate on which should be #1. The ACC has been more impressive than the Big Ten.

Should Matt Ryan be the front-runner for the Heisman Trophy?
Those 2 drives were amazing. His passes were on the money. If he had played an average game and then finished with those, I would confidently say: Maybe. However, he didn't play average. He played awful. Even with those drives, he finished with under 50% completion percentage, 5.5 yards/attempt, 2 touchdowns and 2 interceptions. Those are very Sam Keller-like stats. I'll put him in my Heisman race because it's just asinine not too, but I still don't like him as the best player in college football.

But Matt Ryan is a star QB on an undefeated BCS football team!!?!? How about we compare his season to another QB that fits the same bill (and by no means is/should be in the Heisman discussion):

                                                                                                           

Player	Passing Yards	Comp %	Yards/Attempt	Passing Touchdowns	Interceptions	Passing Efficiency
Matt Ryan	2433	61.0	6.83	19	8	131.48
Todd Boeckman	1799	66.5	8.61	21	8	164.32

Now I would never say Matt Ryan is worse than Todd Boeckman because I think Ryan will become a pretty decent pro. However Todd Boeckman is playing just as well, if not better, than Matt Ryan this season with none of the fanfare.

October 29th Waiver Wire Suggestions

Purdue RB Jaycen Taylor
Iowa RB Albert Young
Colorado RB Hugh Charles
Texas Tech WR Eric Morris
Central Michigan RB Justin Hoskins
UNLV QB Omar Clayton
Tulsa WR Trae Johnson
Oregon TE Ed Dickson
Washington WR Marcel Reese
Georgia RB Knowshon Moreno - one last time
East Carolina WR Jamar Bryant
Connecticut RB Andre Dixon
Rice QB Chase Clement
Rice TE James Casey
N.C. State WR Donald Bowens
Kansas RB/FB Brandon McAnderson
Washington State RB Dwight Tardy
Bowling Green RB Willie Geter
Florida Atlantic TE Jason Harmon
Florida Atlantic WR Cortez Gent
Arizona State RB Keegan Herring
Arizona State RB Dimitri Nance

Injury Report - Week 9

Fresno State RB Lonyae Miller (knee)
Wisconsin RB P.J. Hill (leg)
Virginia QB Jameel Sewell (leg)
Vanderbilt QB Mackenzi Adams (chest)
Arkansas QB Casey Dick (ribs, concussion)
Nebraska QB Sam Keller (shoulder)
UCLA RB Kahlil Bell (undisclosed)
Florida State WR Greg Carr (wrist)
Florida State RB Antone Smith (ankle)
Troy QB Omar Haugabook (hamstring)
MTSU QB Dwight Dasher (knee)
Oregon State RB Yvenson Bernard (shoulder)

October 22nd Waiver Wire Suggestions

Below are some suggestions for your waiver wire pickups for the week of October 22nd. It is important to remember some of these players are only worth a pickup in certain BCS or just leagues using the SEC. Additionally, some players on this list may already be the property of another owner - and this is probably your last shot to pick him up - if they are on waivers.

Connecticut RB Andre Dixon
Clemson WR Aaron Kelly
Georgia Tech RB Rashaun Grant/Jonathan Dwyer (If Tashard Choice is out an extended period of time)
Texas WR Nate Jones
Vanderbilt QB Mackenzi Adams
Wake Forest RB Josh Adams
Wake Forest WR Kenneth Moore
Nevada RB Luke Lippincott
UCLA RB Kahlil Bell
Bowling Green RB Willie Geter
Fresno State RB Ryan Mathews
Kansas State QB Josh Freeman
Virginia RB Mikell Simpson (If Cedric Peerman is out a while)
LSU WR Early Doucet (now healthy)
Colorado State RB Gartrell Johnson
Boise State RB Jeremy Avery (with Ian Johnson out)

October 15th Waiver Wire Suggestions

Below are some suggestions for your waiver wire pickups for the week of October 15th. It is important to remember some of these players are only worth a pickup in certain BCS or just leagues using the SEC. Additionally, some players on this list may already be the property of another owner - and this is probably your last shot to pick him up - if they are on waivers.

TCU QB Andy Dalton
Arizona State RB Keegan Herring
MTSU QB Dwight Dasher
Georgia RB Knowshon Moreno
Pittsburgh QB Pat Bostick
Wake Forest RB Josh Adams
San Jose State WR Kevin Jurovich
Northwestern WR's - Eric Peterman and Ross Lane
Toledo QB D.J. Lenehan
Toledo WR Stephen Williams
Oklahoma State RB Dantrell Savage
Miami, Ohio RB Austin Sykes
Penn State RB Rodney Kinlaw
Wisconsin WR Kyle Jefferson
Kentucky WR Steve Johnson
Air Force RB Chad Hall
Michigan State WR Devin Thomas
Nevada QB Colin Kaepernick

October 9th Waiver Wire Suggestions

Below are some suggestions for your waiver wire pickups for the week of October 9th. It is important to remember some of these players are only worth a pickup in certain BCS or just leagues using the SEC. Additionally, some players on this list may already be the property of another owner - and this is probably your last shot to pick him up - if they are on waivers.

South Carolina QB Chris Smelley
North Carolina RB Anthony Elzy
Marshall RB Darius Marshall
Marshall WR Darius Passmore
Northwestern QB C.J. Bacher
Northwestern RB Omar Conteh
Auburn RB Brad Lester
Duke QB Thaddeus Lewis
Penn State RB Rodney Kinlaw
Georgia RB Knowshon Moreno
Buffalo RB James Starks
Florida State QB Xavier Lee
N.C. State RB Jamelle Eugene
San Jose State WR Kevin Jurovich
SDSU QB Kevin O'Connell
Fresno State RB Ryan Mathews
UTEP QB Trevor Vittatoe
UTEP WR Jeff Moturi
Tulsa WR Trae Johnson
Tulsa WR Brennan Marion

October 1 Waiver Wire Suggestions

Below are some suggestions for your waiver wire pickups for the week of October 1. It is important to remember some of these players are only worth a pickup in certain BCS or just leagues using the SEC. Players like Georgia running back Knowshon Moreno have made this report in previous weeks and while he could easily make this list again, if you haven't picked him up by now in BCS or SEC leagues - he may be the property of another owner.

Southern Mississippi WR Chris Johnson
Boise State WR Jeremy Childs
West Virginia QB Jarrett Brown (if Pat White sits out)
USF RB Jamar Taylor
Central Michigan RB Justin Hoskins
Northern Illinois WR Matt Simon
Ball State RB Frank Edmonds
Mississippi QB Seth Adams (one week option against La. Tech)
Boston College RB Andre Callender
Colorado RB Hugh Charles
Utah RB Darrell Mack
Miami, Ohio RB Cory Jones
Michigan State QB Brian Hoyer
East Carolina RB Chris Johnson
UTEP RB Marcus Thomas
Kansas State WR Jordy Nelson
San Jose State WR Kevin Jurovich
UNLV RB Frank Summers
Nevada QB Nick Graziano
Florida State QB Xavier Lee
MTSU QB Dwight Dasher

Waiver Wire Suggestions

After week four action, here are some waiver wire suggestions for your lineup. While some of these suggestions may be for deep 119 leagues or leagues that only use SEC/ACC players - take a look at this list for your week 5 pickups. Additionally, I've included a few names who may be on the waiver wire in a few leagues - but this is probably your last chance to pick them up.

Tulsa WR Charles Clay
Virginia RB Cedric Peerman
Clemson K Mark Buchholz
Mississippi WR Mike Wallace
Ball State RB MiQuale Lewis
Oklahoma State QB Zac Robinson
Arizona RB Nick Grigsby
Pittsburgh QB Pat Bostick
Kentucky WR Steve Johnson
Toledo WR Stephen Williams
Wyoming RB Devin Moore
Oklahoma State RB Kendall Hunter
Oklahoma State WR Dez Bryant
Arizona State WR Mike Jones
Penn State RB Rodney Kinlaw
UCF QB Mike Greco
UCF WR Kamar Aiken
Wake Forest RB Josh Adams
South Carolina QB Chris Smelley
LSU TE Richard Dickson
Houston QB Case Keenum
Northern Illinois RB Justin Anderson
Baylor WR/TE Justin Akers

Our Defense BlitzIndex

I have tweaked the first edition of our exclusive 2007 college football defense rankings, the Defense BlitzIndex a bit in order to give you the best tool for you to set your lineups each week.

It will probably be handy for you to download and print the spreadsheet, get a feel for the rankings and let them marinate in your mind. Now that you have done that, let me me reintroduce some of the basic concepts.

There are tons of stats out there for you to pour over, but I have focused on the fantasy ones...

• Rush yards allowed/game (RYPG)
• Pass yards allowed/ game (PYPG)
• Points allowed per game (PPG)
• Yards allowed per play (YPP) (new for 2007 formula)

Each of those stats are ranked from 1 to 119 for each team, then I add up the rankings and divide by four to create an equal-weighted index of all the defenses - I don't want any one category to shine above the others. Then I rank the resulting "BlitzIndex" low-to-high for the rankings.

No shock that just like last year, I have no idea why you would start anyone against LSU, except maybe the new man of Steel, Tim Tebow.

The "VAR" column stands for variance, and this score is (RANK RYPG - RANK PYPG) which might be the most useful score on the system, allowing you to see "under the hood" of the national rankings. Positive numbers mean better ranked pass defenses, negative numbers are in red - I highlight the numbers not between 60 and (60) in yellow since those are big statistical differences for a sample of 119, and ones you should pay special attention to.

Big VARs illustrate how flawed looking at just the run and pass in a vacuum can be - let us take #18 Oregon State and #19 Army which have variances in their ranking greater than 60. Oregon State stands as the second best rush defense in the nation but is 65th in passing - dontcha think that the running numbers are strong because no one bother to run since they are easily gashed through the air? Opposite is the case with Army or more interestingly #25 South Carolina where have great pass rankings only because their first three opponents ran all over them.

So if you have a strong RB and are playing the Beavers, I wouldn''t hesitate after looking at the defense in its totality. Use your noggin though - Florida, USC, and Georgia Tech still demand your respect despite the big variance in rankings, especially since most are still in the Top Twenty of PPG allowed.

Last year I was often asked why turnovers were not a part of the story, and my response is that I am not trying to help you pick up a defense each week to start, it is to help you set your lineups. Creating big plays and stopping them are worked in to the yards per play also, in my opinion. I have�noticed a high correlation with YPP to the blitz rankings, so if that continues I may just leave it out and focus on the original three. Or maybe just use the YPP, right?

This brings up a great point - why haven't I worked in strength of schedule? Reason is I can''t get any of the accepted computer ranking companies to license their data to me for a reasonable price, so it will require us all to use some inference. If you know someone who knows someone, let them know about this project.

Email me at vince@fantasycollegeblitz.com to discuss - and especially if you have any ideas on how to tweak the formula.

Fantasy Thoughts for '07

Before the season started I talked with some college fantasy gurus to get their takes on the upcoming fantasy college football season.  I’m posting the transcript now because, as it turns out, it can very busy around late August/early September when running the largest college fantasy site.  (A shameless plug wrapped in a lame excuse – is that a first?)

The gurus I interviewed were:

• Mike Beacom of Pro Fantasy Sports
• Ryan Browder of College Fantasy Bowl
• Steven Lassan of Pro Fantasy Sports
• James Lyons of CFFInsider.com
• Vince Mullins of Fantasy College Blitz

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What would you classify as the biggest difference between college and professional fantasy sports?

(Ryan) The turnover of players. In the pro football, the top fantasy performers are fairly consistent. The same names are at the top of the list every season. This is supported by the fact that the pre-season magazines will basically tell you the same news. In college, the absolute max a player will be a high performer is 4 years. If you get more than 2 years of production, you've struck gold. This creates a difficulty in evaluating talent at this level for fantasy sports. Experts will vary on who they feel are going to be the star performers in any given season. Personal preference becomes a large part of the game.

(James) There are many differences, but the one that stands out to me is the ability of players to have extreme blow-up weeks, sometimes half your scoring comes from one player.  The big RBs and QBs can put up 6 TD games.  You’ve got to have a couple of players capable of blowing up 2 or 3 weeks per year to compete in a college league. 

(Steven) I think one of the biggest differences, if not the biggest is the large amount of players and the injury reports/information available each week. Usually the injury reports in college fantasy football are very vague, as opposed to pro where more is said and reported by the coach. Having 119 teams to choose from in a Division One league is a ton of players to sort through – compared to 32 teams with a smaller roster size. However, that's one of the advantages of college fantasy football – being able to find a great sleeper within the mass of players.

(Mike) College is for the more serious player. It takes a great amount of skill and a competitive owner really has to do his/her homework. But I can honestly say have more fun playing college fantasy football.

(Vince) The sheer number of teams are the biggest factor just ahead of a) the constantly changing rosters from year to year due to graduation, and c) the information advantage available to a good college owner. I can speak best about football - 66 teams in the Big Six conferences, and this year a total of 120 teams in all of FBS. Almost 2x and 4x the NFL makes the level of knowledge and commitment much higher for the college owner.

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What player didn't pan out as you expected in '06?

(James) Sydney Rice at South Carolina.  I thought he would be a consistent weekly scorer last season.  By the time he had a breakout game, a lot of managers had benched him. 

(Steve) I think there were a couple of guys who were major disappointments. Tyrell Sutton of Northwestern didn't live up to expectations; the same could be said for Kenny Irons of Auburn. Although both backs were solid, they certainly didn't equal up to the fantasy expectations we set for them. Arizona State quarterback Rudy Carpenter turned out to be a real bust, as well as Bret Meyer of Iowa State.

(Mike) Kyle Wright . . . wait, every U player, for that matter

(Vince) The names I remember were due to off-field issues.  I think everyone missed on Rudy Carpenter QB Arizona State last year due to the HR turmoil. Tyrell Sutton RB Northwestern dealt with the death of his coach and a young inexperienced staff in his stead. Jarrett Hicks WR Texas Tech had academic issues that were not discussed openly until draft day for most leagues. That is why you have to look at more than talent, you have to define risk/opportunity as well.

(Ryan) Rudy Carpenter. Coming off a short season where he threw for 17 touchdowns and 2 interceptions, he was named starter and ready to put up great numbers. Injuries and the pressure of the Keller/Carpenter saga got to him and he had a very average fantasy season. That being said, Dennis Erickson takes over at Arizona State now and Carpenter is a good sleeper for 2007.

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Who are some of the players you would draft in the mid-late rounds based on the potential of a huge year?

(Steve) I think there are several players who I would watch in the middle rounds – it's the spot that often makes or breaks your draft. One player who I really like is Illinois running back Rashard Mendenhall. Mendenhall had a good year as the backup running back, but with the starting spot all his, I think he's due for a breakout year. A guy like Miami, Ohio's Brandon Murphy is someone who will fall because of injuries, but is probably a 1000 yard back in 2007. Also, system quarterbacks are worth watching. Guys like Max Hall of BYU, Blake Joseph of Houston and the winner of the Baylor quarterback battle could have good fantasy value, particularly in select matchups. At receiver, I'd particularly watch any one of the Texas Tech guys that fall – you never know which one is going to emerge into a fantasy option.

(Mike) I think Curtis Painter will be much more efficient this year. He had great totals in ‘06 but threw too many picks. Expect that to change.

(Vince) We like to focus on QBs in the middle rounds, around the seventh to tenth time around. This year we like Justin Willis of SMU (who was ranked tenth in passing efficiency in 2006), Brian Johnson of Utah (back from knee injury) and Matt Flynn of LSU (starting experience with loads of supporting talent). At other positions are Dantrell Savage RB Oklahoma State, Austin Scott RB Penn State, Maurice Purify WR Nebraska and Andre Caldwell WR Florida.

(James) I think you have to look at freshman RB Noel Devine at WVU.  He is potentially one injury away from seeing fulltime backfield duty.  In a keeper league, I like this for the future.  Probably more of a backup, but my personal pet project this year is senior RB Julius Crosslin at Oklahoma St.  He could be this year’s touchdown vulture and post some 10 yard, 2 TD lines.

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If you could be the college football commissioner for a day, what would you change about the regular season?

(Mike) I would change how schedules are prepared. Make it more systematic, like the NFL. No more cupcake non-conference schedules for BCS contenders.

(Steve) That's a tough one, I like most of the things in place. I would like to see more interesting non-conference matchups, so maybe have a scheduling plan in place like the NFL where the AFC North plays the NFC South one year, NFC East the next, etc. Perhaps have a college football ACC vs. the Big Ten…or the SEC vs. the Big 12. That would toughen the non-conference slate up and end the I-AA cupcake games.

(Vince) Not a thing. Maybe a gentle nudge to strengthen out-of-conference scheduling to repeat offenders, but overall the regular season for college football holds more special meaning than any other sport.