I am going to be running an experiment on fantasy football predictions. Over time I will take various approaches, and analyse their effectiveness. I am starting with what we in international competitive diving call a 'high tariff' approach. Why? Fun.
Dramatic irony fans will particularly enjoy my predictions on. Commentary will follow.
This week, I will be ranking wide receivers according to a complicated experimental metric of which I will only give you the tip of the iceberg. You should take my advice seriously, because I have a PhD in history. My designated Nemesis is the might of ESPN, and specifically Matthew Berry. My hypothesis is basically this: individual player scores can be predicted moderately well over the long term. A game is not a long term. Thus, weekly predictions are a crap-shoot and I reckon I, who has been following the NFL obsessively for a season, might be able to perform averagely well. I am perfectly prepared for my hypothesis to be disproven. It will take a few weeks, of course. At least one week I will be helped by a top statistician from the LSE who has, on listening to my description of most statistical analysis in the NFL, said, 'Hah, Bayesians!'
I am focusing on Wide Receivers first, since they are the most luck/variation strewn.
Notes on my rankings:
Do I really think Roddy White will be top scorer? No. It's really hard to guess this stuff, and I would say that there is only a 75% chance that all my predictions are perfectly accurate. But I don't think it will be Randy Moss either, because most weeks it isn't. Every week some WR gets two touchdowns, and I don't know who it will be this week, and I actually secretly fancy it just might be Greg Jennings in a shootout, partly because he's in my fantasy team and if he does it will make me look like a crazy futuristic genius. But I am not putting him #1 in my predictions all the same. It's not science.
I am including some bonus fun facts. Can you guess which one isn't true?*
1. Roddy White (10/21) - Roddy's real name is Sharod, which is not a real name
2. Larry Fitzgerald (1/2) - Larry is three weeks older than Greg Jennings, and that has to be worth something. His dad Larry was the first sportswriter to cover his son in a Super Bowl
3. Brandon Marshall (8/12) - The Beast is a good nickname, which he shares with South African prop forward Tendai Mtawarira. Tendai like me, was born in Zimbabwe. Thus, in a logical paradox that even Zeno could not have unpicked, I am Brandon Marshall. I will score at least one touchdown, and gain at least 90 yards, unless I am wrong
4. Wes Welker (7/8) - if the dinged-up Colts secondary is focusing on Randy Moss, Welker is going to make hay up the seams. Does this sound lke I know what I am talking about?
5. Dwayne Bowe (20/24) - he has a brother called Wayne. He is exactly a year younger than Greg Jennings
6. Percy Harvin (24/18) - a Viking is going to do really well on Sunday. Percy tested positive for marijuana at the NFL combine, adding more fuel to the fire caused by his v. low Wonderlic score, but I still think it is going to be him. My reasons for this are: intangible
7. Hines Ward (6/4) - he is half Korean, is missing a ligament in one knee and has a degree in consumer economics. His nacknames include 'Ketchup', 'Psycho Ward', and 'The Dalai Lama of Football'. His nicknames also include these. He has no nicknacknames. I like the cut of his jib for some reason, and I fancy Big Ben to have a good game
8. Greg Jennings (ESPN 19 / Matt Berry 16) - Greg Jennings was born in Kalamazoo
9. Marques Colston (3/1) - he part owns an indoor football team called the Harrisburg Stampede, he is one of the first seventh round draft picks to start his first regular season game and holds the record for most receptions in first two seasons
10. Jerricho Cotchery (25/26) - Braylon Edwards will attract coverage away from him, and he's an incredibly nice guy, which must make Mark Sanchez want to pass to him
11. Reggie Wayne (4/5) - Reginald DeVincey Wayne was named after a PG Wodehouse character
12. Vincent Jackson (5/6) - even I couldn't defend against this guy. He's a monster. If I played in a keeper league, he'd be my number three WR after Larry son of Larry and Andre the Giant. Or maybe he'd be my number two, since Kurt Warner will eventually take the long walk, and then Schaub is good but not as good as Philip Rivers (All the Philip Rivers Run into the Sea and Yet the Sea is Not Full), so who knows. Not me
13. 85 (11/22) - He'll get a TD and enough yards. Someone made a joke somewhere recently about him, saying that he has a werd inverse ADD - if people aren't paying attention to him, he can't concentrate. If whoever made this joke isn't a Nemesis of mine, then he or she will do until a Nemesis comes along
14. Sidney Rice (15/9) - Sidney's father is Jerry Rice, but not that Jerry Rice
15. Miles Austin (9/7) - honestly? I think Roy Marshall might have a better day than Miles Austin because people will be paying him more attention. But 'The State Capital' is a good enough nickname to add to his hot streak and get him ranked up here
16. Donald Driver (13/15) - Donald went to Alcorn State University. Alcorn is not a state
17. Randy Moss (2/3) - the coach who let him go prior to the 2007 season, saying he was past his prime, said that Moss told him 'I'm too old to practice on Wednesday and Thursday, but I'm not too old to play on Sunday'. Moss is still brilliant and I hav eonly put him this low in my first set of predictions because I am trying to make some waves. If he doesn't get in the end-zone, I might luck out
18. DeSean Jackson (12/17) - DeSean's school team was called the Jack Rabbits. My rabbit is called Jack. This is a joke. I don't have a rabbit
19. Nate Burleson (21/14) - in 2006, he was named the best-dressed player in the league by Maxim. I don't know how much store to set by this. I wouldn't let the style editor of Maxim choose my clothes
20. Derrick Mason (17/10) - Derrick is nearly as old as me. Unlike him, I don't have two children. Like him, when I have two children, I will call them Bailee My-Lin and Derrick II
Quick Picks at RB and QB
RB
1. Steven Jackson (ESPN 7 / Matthew Berry 10)
2. Ronnie Brown (10/8)
3. Michael Turner (4/3)
4. Adrian Peterson (2/4)
5. Thomas Jones (8/6)
6. Laurence Maroney (20/19) - next two years he's going to score a lot of points. Why do I think this? Not really sure. It cannot solely be because I thought of the joke Laurence Maroney of Arabia? No, not solely
7. MJD (6/9)
8. Rashard Mendenhall (13/12)
9. Pierre Thomas (9/7)
10. LT (18/21)
Yes, I have ranked LT at 10 mainly out of sentiment, because we share a birthday. But I do think he's got some big games left in him. I have not put Ray Rice in this list for no very good reason other than that I am in a hurry and don't want to fiddle with it again. I omitted DeAngelo Williams in case of injury. If he starts and plays a full game at full power, consider him my #3.
I have put Steven Jackson on top because I read an interview with him and thought he seemed like a good guy. It was only one interview, so I am not inviting him to dinner yet. If he does come to dinner at mine, this is what the kitchen looks like, as die-hard readers know to their very serious cost in terms of time.
Also, as per the WRs, it's hard to know who will suddenly run for three TDs, and him against New Orleans seems like it Jackson might be a possibility. I think the other person who might have a big week is Marion Barber, fantasy fans. Dallas are going to score a lot of points, and I don't fancy Austin for them. Like I say, I honestly wouldn't be surprised by a big game for Marshall, but ditto Witten and Barber. I've left Barber on my bench all the same.
QB
1. Brees (ESPN 1 / Mattew Berry 1) - I went to New Orleans last year. Based on what everyone said about Brees, I would invite him to dinner
2. Rodgers (2/3) - shootout, like I say. I think the O-Line will just about cope with Ware. Just about
3. Rothlisberger (9/9) - partly because of my new love of Hines Ward
4. Romo (7/6) - he's growing on me
5. Favre (5/2)
6. Ryan (14/15)
7. Brady (3/5)
8. Manning (4/7)
9. Orton (17/17)
10. Warner (6/4)
It's been too long since a picture? What would be a good picture? I am going with the policy chosen by every single nature programme ever made when things look like they might flag. No one doesn't love penguins.
CONCUSSION NEWS
1. The most interesting part of Malcolm Gladwell's football-is-like-dogfighting argument is that players do dangerous things because they are conditioned to please us and the society they are part of. It's a simplification, but it says something real. Players' motivations are, in general, fun. They care about the game, up to a point. They massively care about their jobs and money, like the rest of us. Listen to the ex-pros talking about contracts, or read Jim Bouton's Ball Four.
They also care about being perceived as manly. Here's a soccer comparison, comparison fans: stupid English defenders miss vital penalties all the time because they are obsessed with manliness. A few huge games in every international soccer tournament are concluded by penalties. The trope that has grown up around penalties is, 'Who isn't ducking the responsibility? Who is standing up to be counted? Who isn't hiding?' Thus, Jamie Carragher, Gareth Southgate and David Batty can't stop themselves saying they are up for a vital job they haven't practiced and aren't good at. They miss. The press lionises their bravery instead of saying they're idiots.
2. Medical care should be as good as possible, but football's never going to be as safe as sewing, and people are going to carry on taking risks to play it in, at the very least, the medium term. Maybe if we were inventing a new game, we wouldn't make it as dangerous as football. Or maybe we would.
Whatever, the world was not built by perfectly rational technocrats. And here's a comparison with drugs policy, comparison fans: the UK government's chief drugs advisor, a guy called David Nutt, became the government's ex-chief drugs advisor after saying things like, 'ecstasy is less dangerous than horseriding' and 'alcohol causes more damage than marijuana'.* Lots of people have rightly and self-righteously pointed out that he is only stating facts and what kind of moron is upset by that?
I am not, and I absolutely want scientists to describe relative dangers of different activities, and put numbers on them. On the other hand, I can also see why it irritated his employers, and think it demonstrated his unfitness for a role with political implications. Nutt and the Nuttlets want a rational drugs policy covering alcohol and tobacco as well as the illegal drugs, and they say say that the rest of the country has a more mature view of drugs than the politicians.
This is pretty precisely untrue. Well understood science should influence policy. But a mature attitude to the problem of drugs understands that we do not create legal frameworks out of nothing according to ideal rational principles (upon which no one agrees anyway, let's remember).
Smoking and drinking are dangerous activities our society has enshrined as legal. Over time, medical advice and public education slowly helps us reduce the problems they cause, we aren't suddenly going to ban them. Maybe the only rational policy is laissez-faire, but can politicians viably do this? No, obviously. It would be hard even to legalise cannabis, since it makes people psychotic. It might kill fewer people than smoking does, but that's not the point, in the world of the possible. Legalising something that is obviously dangerous is not the same thing as banning something dangerous that people accept. It's mucky and unclear where the lines are, but that's politics and being a grown-up. I don't have solutions.
Football is not about to stop, but scientific reports give people better information on which to base rational decisions. Adults are allowed to take risks. Etc.
NEMESIS WATCH
Particularly good work from Tanier this week. On New York Jets boss Rex Ryan (Jets and Dolphins are big rivals, Jets are playing the also-Florida-based Jaguars:
Rex Ryan spent two days in Florida during the bye week. He wasn’t scouting the Jaguars; he was relaxing, his identity concealed from Dolphins fans by a wardrobe of Yankees gear. A tough guy on a Florida beach, in disguise, surrounded by enemies: all you need is a femme fatale and a botched robbery, and you have the makings of a great Elmore Leonard novel.And a couple of classy throwaway lines, the second one of which I haven't got time to explain to casual readers, but it's very good.
Few defenders can cover Fitzgerald one-on-one, and none of them play for the SeahawksI haven't got time to check, so I may be being terribly unfair, but I'm beginning to wonder whether Gregg Easterbrook might not be a Horse's Arse instead of a Nemesis.
In preparation for the Cowboys’ pass rush, Mike McCarthy must take draconian sack-prevention measures. Aversion therapy works well: for every dump-off receiver Aaron Rodgers ignores, he should be forced to run a lap while listening to a Brett Favre-themed podcast on his MP3 player.
* The untrue fact was that I don't have a rabbit. No it isn't. I don't have a rabbit.
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