Posts tagged Reality Sports Online fantasy football

RSO Writer’s League Update: Playoffs

Danny Kelly has always been a Jamal Charles fan (who hasn't? Raiders fans, I imagine). Photo by Phillip Macgruder.
Bob Harris and Jamaal Charles? A winning combination. See below. Photo by Phillip Macgruder.

Congratulations to Bob Harris and Mike Clay, who will be playing in the championship game of the Reality Sports Online Writer’s League. Harris’ team, the fourth seed, was hot in the playoffs, averaging 150 points the past two weeks to defeat Jeff Tefertiller’s fifth seed team and then upset the top seeded squad of Jim Day with a 155-120 victory. Harris received 61 points from Jamaal Charles and received additional help from Danny Amendola’s a 25-point afternoon to out-point Day’s squad that didn’t get its typical advantage from Peyton Manning and Jimmy Graham.

Mike Clay, the No.2 seed, defeated Sigmund Bloom in the semifinals 135-100, thanks to a combined 57 points from Nick Foles and Indianapolis’ team defense. Bloom, who earned a combined 74 points from Shane Vereen and LeSean McCoy in Week 14 to defeat season points leader Matt Waldman in the quarterfinals, only saw this running back duo generate 18 points in the semis.

The tale of the tape for Clay and Harris’ teams is fascinating. Clay has tremendous depth at quarterback with Foles and Drew Brees while Harris is getting by with Matt Ryan and Ryan Fitzpatrick. Matt Forte and Danny Woodhead power Clay’s team at RB and Harris sports Charles and Knowshon Moreno. Clay has the advantage with receiver depth, but Harris’ team is capable of huge individual performances.

Good luck to Bob and Mike who will be competing for a $1000 purse that will be donated to the charity of their choice.

To learn more about the league and Reality Sports Online’s excellent concept, check out this page. In case you haven’t thought about it, I am getting paid to give them my endorsement. However, I don’t do this often – and I am contacted monthly with some kind of offer. RSO is something I truly value and I agreed to start a league and keep a monthly diary because I would have paid to start a league with this format if I knew about it before they reached out to me.

I’ll be keeping this monthly diary next year as well, because I believe in the concept. Stay tuned for opportunities to earn a discount for starting a league next year. In fact, to risk doing the wrong thing – Start your own league and get a discount when you use this coupon code: RSP20%OFF.

RSO Writers’ League Diary Preseason Week 3

RSO founder Matt Papson acquired Antonio Brown as a part of a rebuilding plan. Photo by bmward_2000.
RSO founder Matt Papson acquired Antonio Brown as a part of a rebuilding plan. Photo by bmward_2000.

Every month I’ll be writing something about the start-up keeper-contract-salary-auction league I’m running at Reality Sports Online. You can read more about RSO’s excellent league format here. And if you want to start a league with your friends or join a league as an individual, you can earn a 20 percent discount when you use the promo code RSP20%OFF. 

in case you missed it, I recruited some of my favorite competitors from the fantasy football industry to participate:

  1. Jeff Tefertiller – Footballguys
  2. Ryan McDowell – Dynasty League Football
  3. Sigmund Bloom – Footballguys
  4. Mike MacGregor – FFToday
  5. Bryan Fontaine – Pro Football Focus
  6. Tim Stafford – Dynasty League Football
  7. Matt Papson- Reality Sports Online
  8. Matt Waldman – Footballguys/RSP/Football Outsiders
  9. Jason Wood – Footballguys
  10. Mike Clay – Pro Football Focus/NBC
  11. Bob Harris and Mike Dempsey – Football Diehards/Sirius XM
  12. Rivers McCown – Football Outsiders
  13. Jim Day – Fantasy Taz
  14. Lance Zierlein – Sideline View

You can’t get much better when it comes to the combined fantasy football savvy of this crew. Since the draft ended in late May there have been 56 waiver wire transactions and 33 players traded to other in the past 93 days. That’s almost a player changing hands per day. RSO founder Matt Papson is behind 19 of these trades after he inherited a team after the draft with a huge cap surplus. Here’s who he’s traded and acquired during this time:

Dealt

  • 3rd Round Pick
  • Maurice Jones-Drew
  • Eddie Royal
  • Zach Ertz
  • Dennis Pitta
  • Plaxico Burress
  • Ryan Fitzpatrick
  • Robert Meachem
  • Knowshon Moreno
  • Mark Sanchez

These are players that were acquired in the auction by the former owner who had to leave early due to unforseen circumstances and he didn’t leave much of a draft list. The result was a team with a lot of D-level fantasy performers but a ton of cap room to use.

Naturally, the former Eagles employee Papson has Michael Vick as his starter in the Reality Sports Online Writer's League. Photo by Matthew Straubmuller.
Naturally, the former Eagles employee Papson has Michael Vick as his starter in the Reality Sports Online Writer’s League. Photo by Matthew Straubmuller.

 

Papson, a former cap expert with the Philadelphia Eagles, jumped at the opportunity to take over this team because he realized how much financial leeway he had to rebuild the team by giving cap relief to the rest of the league in return for more promising long-term options.  You’ll see what I mean with the acquisitions below:

  • Alex Smith
  • Vick Ballard
  • Antonio Brown
  • Jonathan Baldwin
  • Rashard Mendenhall
  • Chad Henne
  • Michael Crabtree
  • Darrius Heyward-Bey
  • Donald Brown
  • Aaron Hernandez

Because Papson had so much cap room, he could absorb salaries of less-inspired options like Hernandez, Henne,  Brown, and Baldwin, while acquiring strong starters like Antonio Brown and Crabtree and serviceable depth like Smith, Mendenhall, Ballard, and Heyward-Bey.

His team now looks a lot better than it did after the draft:

  • QBs (start 1): Michael Vick, Alex Smith, and Chad Henne
  • RBs (start 2): Rashard Mendenhall, Ryan Mathews, Jonathan Dwyer Christine Michael, Vick Ballard, Peyton Hillis, Delone Carter, Donald Brown, and James Starks
  • WRs (start 3-4): Antonio Brown, Kenny Britt,  Darrius Heyward-Bey, Aaron Mellette, Michael Crabtree, Jason Avant, Harry Douglas, Michael Jenkins, Chris Harper, Eric Rogers, and Jonathan Baldwin
  • TEs (start 1-2): Kyle Rudolph, Anthony Fasano, Delanie Walker, and Michael Hoomanawanui
  • DST: New England
  • PK: David Akers

The team doesn’t have a great outlook this year unless he has 2-3 strong surprises at running back  and at least one overachiever at receiver. However, Papson is in a much better position to turn this team into a much better squad in 2014 due to his cap room of $28 million.

TEAM 2013 2013 ROOM 2014 2015 2016
SALARY SALARY SALARY SALARY
Matt Waldman $120,343,604 $2,656,396 $77,840,327 $17,472,051 $5,180,000
Sigmund Bloom $114,401,854 $8,598,146 $76,924,424 $66,591,995 $22,960,000
Bob Harris $92,170,194 $30,829,806 $54,648,827 $17,112,459 $0
Tim Stafford $116,270,444 $6,729,556 $94,096,434 $62,852,424 $20,580,000
Bryan Fontaine $111,816,814 $11,183,186 $72,813,210 $30,729,608 $1,960,000
Matt Papson $94,988,621 $28,011,379 $64,724,175 $19,619,729 $0
Jim Day $122,217,721 $782,279 $84,071,728 $61,630,735 $17,780,000
Jeff Tefertiller $123,000,227 ($227) $119,408,970 $71,227,712 $16,800,000
Jason Wood $121,988,128 $1,011,872 $94,011,311 $48,419,492 $19,740,000
Rivers McCown $115,153,657 $7,846,343 $78,761,128 $61,638,599 $15,820,000
Mike MacGregor $111,856,984 $11,143,016 $88,618,392 $63,934,800 $27,160,000
Lance Zierlein $112,661,484 $10,338,516 $71,608,178 $50,644,871 $7,420,000
Ryan McDowell $106,429,757 $16,570,243 $73,579,640 $61,004,523 $28,980,000
Mike Clay $121,503,737 $1,496,263 $46,694,512 $14,700,286 $3,640,000

The cap room over the next three years is likely the most fascinating aspect of this league. Will owners like Papson and Bob Harris benefit from the space as injuries and disappointing performances teams throughout the league? Can they acquire the right players that this money will afford them? All great questions as we move forward.

My Team

I’ve had 10 waiver wire transactions since May and most are players I’ve been monitoring during camp. I’m hoping that some of them show enough long-term promise for me to tag at year’s end or they surprise this year:

  • Zach Sudfeld – until the Patriots tight end fumbled the ball with the one’s on Thursday night, he has been excellent. I still think he earns playing time and might surprise with starter production in fantasy leagues at least until Rob Gronkowski returns. He’s fine depth behind my starter Vernon Davis if Dwayne Allen doesn’t look good after rehabbing a foot injury.
  • C.J. Anderson – This sounds crazy, but if he didn’t get hurt he might have been this year’s Alfred Morris. A big back with a low center of gravity, Anderson looked more impressive breaking tackles and avoiding penetration than any back on the Broncos depth chart and was just earning second-team reps when he went down. I think the Broncos will keep him and give him a shot to work his way up the depth chart in the second half of the season. I was impressed with Anderson at Cal, but didn’t think he’d be drafted because he wasn’t the starter at Cal. For some additional perspective, neither was Willie Parker at UNC, Priest Holmes at Texas, William Andrews at Auburn (played FB for Joe Cribbs), or Terrell Davis at Georgia.
  • Russell Shephard – I don’t think he’ll do much this year, but I do think he flashed enough as a rookie with little experience at the position that he could develop at a fast rate and earn a bigger shot by next year. Former Rice quarterback Bert Emanuel wasn’t a bad receiver in Atlanta, perhaps Shephard can follow in those footsteps.
  • Spencer Ware – You know I love me some Spencer Ware. Talent often has a funny way of rising to prominence – especially physical players like Ware.
  • Shaun Draughn – I’m not impressed with Knile Davis at all thus far. While Draughn hasn’t played as well as he did last year, I’d be surprised if he’s not part of the backfield picture and a prominent part if Jamal Charles can’t finish the year.
  • Chad Spann – Not much has been said about Spann after his first week in Jets camp. It’s hard to tell if he’ll earn a role, but I really haven’t seen enough of him in preseason to make a call on him.
  • Austin Collie – A terrific receiver when healthy, but I don’t know about the fit in San Francisco and there’s enough rust that he might need a team willing to be patient with him and that’s about has common as purple grizzly bears.
  • Julius Thomas – He continues to look good and might force his way into the Broncos’ lineup with a quarterback who isn’t shy about targeting open players regardless of their draft round, contract, or level of stardom.

Although he may seem like a waiver wire gem, I actually acquired Kenbrell Thompkins in the start-up auction. It’s early, but so far he has proven to be one of my more astute moves now he’s close to earning a starting role in New England. Truth be told, this is the type of move that normally doesn’t work out for me, but I just might have picked the right long shot this year.

Here’s my depth chart heading into the regular season:

  • QBs (start 1): Jay Cutler, Carson Palmer, and Sean Renfree
  • RBs (start 2): Steven Jackson, Arian Foster, Ben Tate, Ryan Williams, Shaun Draughn, Spencer Ware, Chad Spann, and C.J. Anderson
  • WRs (start 3-4): Calvin Johnson, DeSean Jackson, Cecil Shorts, Kenbrell Thompkins, Keenan Allen, Travis Benjamin, Marvin Jones, Marquess Wilson, Austin Collie, Russell Shephard, and Da’Rick Rogers
  • TEs (start 1-2): Vernon Davis, Dwayne Allen, Zach Sudfeld, and Luke Willson
  • DST: Seattle
  • PK: Sebastian Janikowski

Can’t say I love my team right now. Running back needs to stay healthy and I’m concerned about my lack of depth. I also have concerns about my kicker unless Terrelle Pryor can get into the lineup and at least scramble his way into field goal position enough times in games for respectable production. I think my receivers can carry me some weeks if my running backs can stay healthy and play like strong RB2s every week.

Until next month . . .

Ready to try a start-up keeper-contract-salary-auction league experience that’s easy to play and even easier to run? Go to Reality Sports Online and either start a league with your friends or join a league as an individual. You can earn a 20 percent discount when you use the promo code RSP20%OFF. 

 

RSO Team: Football Outsiders’ Rivers McCown

It's a bad idea to evaluate a smile the way you critique his release. Photo by PDA.Photo
Any team with Cam Newton as the quarterback is primed for big weeks. Rivers McCown of Football Outsiders gives you the rest of the scoop on his RSO squad from last month’s auction. Photo by PDA.Photo

Rivers McCown makes my Futures column look better. He makes all the Football Outsiders look better – at least in print. McCown participated in our recent Reality Sports Online writer draft. This is an auction league that includes multi-year contracts. Go here to learn more about the league.  You can join a league for $9.99 as an individual or form a league with your friends. Go to www.realitysportsonline.com and use the promotion code RSP20%OFF, you’ll earn a 20 percent discount. 

Pre-Draft Strategy

I actually didn’t have time to come in with much of a strategy. I rather liked how it turned out, and I had a few big ideas going through my head when creating the team (get settled at RB early and target older receivers with the belief that they’ll be cheaper), but I can’t attest that I had some grand, unified theory come true. In retrospect, I would have aimed for one very good, young receiver with my four-year deal rather than David Wilson, but I’m not dissatisfied.

For a time, D.J. Harper was considered the best back at Boise State - and Doug Martin was on the team . Photo by Football Schedule.
McCown thought his deal on Martin was such a steal that the league was going to roll back the auction, but he made off in the night with a top RB at a great contract. Photo by Football Schedule.

How the Auction Unfolded

Quarterback Yrs $ Running Back Yrs $
Cam Newton (CAR)
3 49.0
Doug Martin (TB)
3 67.5
Josh Freeman (TB) R
1 3.5
David Wilson (NYG)
4 56.5
Chase Daniel (KC) R**
1 0.5
Stepfan Taylor (ARI) R
3 R
Theo Riddick (DET) R
3 R
Willis McGahee (DEN) R
1 2.5
Montario Hardesty (CLE) R
1 1.5
Daniel Thomas (MIA) R
1 1.0
Michael Smith (TB) R
1 0.5
Jeremy Stewart (OAK) R**
1 0.5
Wide Receiver Yrs $ Tight End Yrs $
Andre Johnson (HOU)
2 32.5
Jermichael Finley (GB)
2 6.0
Reggie Wayne (IND)
1 15.0
Tyler Eifert (CIN) R
3 R
Lance Moore (NO)
1 4.5
Fred Davis (WAS) R
1 1.5
Mohamed Sanu (CIN) R
1 2.5
Rueben Randle (NYG) R
1 2.5
Malcom Floyd (SD)
1 2.5
Jarius Wright (MIN) R
1 1.5
T.J. Graham (BUF) R**
1 0.5
Nate Burleson (DET) R
1 0.5
Justin Hunter (TEN) R
3 R
Ryan Swope (ARI) R
3 R
Kicker Yrs $ Defense Yrs $
Rob Bironas (TEN) R
1 0.5
Chicago
1 0.5
Ryan Succop (KC)
1 0.5
Pittsburgh
1 0.5

**These players were acquired via free agency after the draft. 

I think I got Doug Martin for a song because nobody was awake yet – I was surprised that didn’t get rewound when it happened. That enabled me to get a little more aggressive with the other guys I had targeted. I think the two biggest mistakes I made was not getting a third “established” back (because who knows what will happen with McGahee, Ball, Hillman, etc.) and losing a bidding war with Mike Clay for Antonio Brown when he was the last truly elite receiver (in my mind) on the board. I recovered and garnered a lot of possible WR3 guys, but none of them have Brown’s upside and I could have spent less on the margins to bring him in without losing much.

The quarterback shuffle was the most interesting part of the league for me. I think there were some good bargains with the older quarterbacks, but I was dead-set on a young guy. I knew that a Matt Waldman league was not a place where Russell Wilson would go cheap. Colin Kaepernick got thrown out early and was surprisingly expensive. Luck got thrown out early and was ridiculously expensive. So I hitched my wagon to Cam Newton and went a little over my initial range. If Carolina continues to involve him in the run game, he’s the one quarterback with the body I’d bet on to survive it, so I was less hesitant to spend on him than I would have been with some of the other young quarterbacks.

Best/Worst Deals

While I disagree with McCown about the value of Finley relative to Davis, the recent non-playoff productivity isn't that far away. Photo by Elvis Kennedy.
While I disagree with McCown about the value of Finley relative to Davis, the recent non-playoff productivity isn’t that far away. Photo by Elvis Kennedy.

Martin is my best deal, clearly. I also though Finley was a decent bargain at his price given how guys like Vernon Davis and Tony Gonzalez went for at least $8 million. My least favorite bid was for Fred Davis, who I was just trying to bump up – $1.5 million isn’t a killer, and there’s upside, but it’s injury-dependent. I’m happy he’s my third tight end.

Good Deals By Other Writers

McCown thought Sigmund Bloom's acquisition of LeSean McCoy was one of the best deals of the Reality Sports Auction. Photo by Matthew Straubmuller.
McCown thought Sigmund Bloom’s acquisition of LeSean McCoy was one of the best deals of the Reality Sports Auction. Photo by Matthew Straubmuller.

I am a big fan of Sigmund Bloom’s LeSean McCoy deal – I think it fit the basic scale of my Martin deal, but was just a little more expensive. I thought Jim Day struck gold with Eric Decker for three years, $25 million. Antonio Gates for $1 million is a deal that made my jaw drop.

Honestly, outside of the Gronkowski deal, I thought Bloom had a few other killer deals, too. Jordy Nelson was a sneaky steal at $32.5 million for 3 years, but put me in the camp that wouldn’t have paid more than the league minimum for Sam Bradford.

And as good as A.J. Green is, I think he’s going to have a hard time living up to the $92.5 million, 3-year deal that Lance Zierlein signed him to while running his auction at a Little League game.

Favorite Team (Other Than Yours)

I think Bloom and Bob Harris put together the most complete teams. They have the strongest receiving corps. Harris needs a second running back to step up and Bloom needs Roethlisberger to stay healthy all season. If either one of those things break right they have tough teams with a lot of depth.

Assessment of the Reality Sports Online Platform

The functionality was fine. I wish I understood a little more about how the top bid algorithm was decided, but that’s just my inner nerd.

Your Team’s Short-Term/Long-Term Outlook

Short-term, I think this team has a great chance as long as the running backs stay healthy. Long-term, it really depends on how the receiving situation shakes out. Can Mohamed Sanu make me feel good about that two-year deal? Is the lack of depth on the market going to make it hard for me to replace Reggie Wayne? Am I going to have a chance at Marqise Lee? Haha. That’s the area where the turnover is going to be hard to predict right now, but I’d rather have holes to fill there than at the other spots.