#profootballfocus

For the past few years, websites such as Pro Football Focus have found their way into the fan consciousness in regard to determining the value of a player. NBC has even gone to show a players’ ranking on Pro Football Focus during pregame introductions. Outlets such as Sports Illustrated and Bleacher Report constantly cite analytics when discussing how well a player is performing.

However, there…

ProFootballFocus' Neil Hornsby gets deep into the X's and O's with a breakdown of the league's best at different positions in kickoff coverage. I won't pretend to know what he's talking about, but one Patriot did make the list:

L5 & R5 (Force)

The football analytics website ProFootballFocus is well known for reviewing every game and providing a score for each player on every play. This obviously can be subjective and therefore their reports are open to criticism and discussion, but the effort must be applauded.

After each game the site puts together a game review and nominates one player from both teams (not necessarily from the winner) who made the biggest impact in the game. Below are the totals for the Patriots games (note Tom Brady never won a game ball, this may be considered either an oversight or a general acknowledgement that he would win it almost every week and therefore render the award useless).

PROFOOTBALLFOCUS compares the new sixteen offensive coordinators to the former coordinators who they have replaced.  

The significance may foresee what changes positive or negative will take place and which fantasy football players will be affected by these changes.

Now while some may see these changes as being a forecast for huge fantasy numbers for other players this could be a huge hit in fantasy production.

Also it is important to keep in mind teams such as the San Francisco 49ers who changed not just coaches but team philosophy. 

Last off-season it would have been impossible to predict the rise of the San Francisco 49ers since they was no sign of communication with players and coaches due to the NFL lockout.  However the 49ers would go 13-3 and almost made the SuperBowl.

Now the problem is that changes in coaching did not have the same positive effect for most of the 49ers in terms of fantasy football production. 

Example Running-back Frank Gore:

Gore had 282 attempts rushing the most he has ever had however his receiving numbers took a huge impact with only 17 receptions.  A clear change in coaching philosophy using Gore as a blocker instead of a receiver.

Example QB Alex Smith had his best overall statistical year.

Last season QB Alex Smith had a QB rating of 90.7 he was the 9th overall best passer rating during the 2011 NFL season.  

Now while the passer rating is not as significant as lets say yards thrown, or touchdowns thrown, the rating is a sign of not turning the ball over and that helped the all around production of the entire team.

Now going into a new season will this production increase the value of Smith, Gore, and Davis?  Yes, but the addition of endzone threat Randy Moss suggest that the 49ers are addressing a problem they had last year and that is not having a player besides Davis who could stretch the field.

My point is a change in coaching can affect a teams production but a fantasy players production may not see the same positive results.  

Will Smith and Gore continue to produce decent numbers? Yes, but will that translate to fantasy production as well? No

Fantasy Football production can be found just as easily on teams that are not winning and a coach that believes in going to his "go to" player is a fantasy gem!

No greater example can be found than Buffalo Bills Head Coach Chan Gailey and his constant calling on QB Ryan Fitzpatrick to bail him out.  While Fitzpatrick became a fantasy football starter his team went into the dog house.

Example of QB Ryan Fitzpatrick

Fitzpatrick threw 24 TD's and 3832 yards and also 23 interceptions with a 79.1 passer rating to boot.  Not to mention Fitzpatricks 569 attempts!

Gailey should get Fantasy Football Coach of the year with that philosophy! 

With that said people always ask me what do you look at overall when trying to decide which player to take on draft day and the answer is always the same.  Attempts will make a player a fantasy star not percentages.

If a head coach gives you the first, second, twenty fifth chance to make a play eventually you will make that play.  That is just the law of averages.