Friday, September 3, 2010

My Fantasy Football 2010 Draft

This coming Thursday is a Holy Day of Observation in the Patrick household, as the NFL kicks off the 2010 season with a great match up between the defending Super Bowl champion Saints and Brett "Okay, one more year" Favre's Vikings. Along with the real NFL, it's the season for goofy nerds like myself to while away some time with fantasy football. Now last year, as you many (bazillions?) dedicated readers of my blog may know, was my first time drafting a fantasy football team and the Peyton Manning-led Sun Runners struggled to a 4-9 record in the regular season before winning both their playoff games in the consolation bracket to earn the # 7 spot out of 10 teams.

This time around I have a much better idea of how the game works, and an extra year's knowledge of which players are productive and which ones tend to be streaky. I quite like who I ended up with, and I can pretty much guarantee the new and improved Accelerated Sun Runners are going to be competitive.

But wait, there's more!

The Wife wanted to see what all the hullabaloo was about, and decided to draft a team in the same league as me. She doesn't know much about football beyond the names of handsome starting quarterbacks, but she'll probably end up beating me anyway!

Regardless, here's my team for 2010:

STARTERS

QB Tom Brady Not my first choice, but still one of the top five QBs in the league . . .
RB Ryan Mathews A little bit of a gamble here, but everything points to him getting a lot of carries for the Chargers.
RB Ahmad Bradshaw He looked great in the preseason, and I'm pretty sure he's edged out Brandon Jacobs for the starting role in New York
RB/WR Donald Driver Yes he's getting older, but with Aaron Rogers behind center, he's going to get some catches . . .
WR Wes Welker As long as he stays healthy, he will rack up some yards.
WR Terrell Owens He and Ocho will be so much fun to watch, I just had to have one of them.
TE Jermichael Finley Again with the Rogers effect.
D/ST Jets All that hype on Hard Knocks better pay off.
K Ryan Longwell Operative theory being that the Vikings will move the ball well, but have to settle for a lot of field goals.

BACK-UPS

WR Darrius Heyward-Bey This guy has worked incredibly hard during the off-season and has a much more accurate QB, so I figure he's worth a look.
QB Matt Ryan The Falcons are a dark horse prediction for the Super Bowl, and Ryan could have a very big year.
RB Laurence Maroney I'm not real happy here, as the Patriots aren't a great running team and Maroney might not get many carries, but he was the best available. I'll probably drop him to waivers if an undrafted back starts to surprise people.
TE Visanthe Siancoe He's a big producer.
D/ST Falcons A pure shot in the dark here, as there weren't many good choices left.
RB Peyton Hillis A sentimental choice, as he looked awesome in the Browns' preseason games and I have to have at least one Browns' player on the squad.
K Garrett Hartley With the Saints offense, he'll be kicking a lot of extra points.

6 comments:

Jay said...

We're more college football fans in our house than NFL, but last year I bumped into a guy at the MN State Fair wearing this shirt and knew it had to be mine!

;)

Jeremy Patrick said...

Nice! I would totally wear one of those . . .

The Wife said...

I protest, husband. I am learning quarterbacks and watching football because I enjoy spending time with you - and as you know, I wouldn't recognize most of these guys if they tackled me. Therefore, their relative handsomeness has nothing to do with it.

Just for that, I believe MY fantasy football team is going to have to meet YOUR fantasy football team in the stadium parking lot to throw down. :-)

Bal said...

Figured I might as well tell you who I ended up with on my Yahoo team... (the draft was an "automatic" draft where you could set up your list of preferences ahead of time and then it pulled from the top of your list when it was your turn...)

QB : Drew Brees ...hoping for a big year out of this guy

WR : Reggie Wayne ...great pickup

WR : Michael Crabtree ...a full season for him in a weak division could be big numbers (depending on how SF's QB does)

RB : Jonathan Stewart & Jamaal Charles ...likely will look to pick up someone here that is stronger. not thrilled with my backs

W/T : Wes Welker ...not my first choice but we'll see how that turns out

K : Garrett Hartley ...NO should give him some chances to put up points

DEF : NO ...not sure here

Bench : TE Jermichael Finely (um ... ok), RB Ahmad Bradshaw, QB Donovan McNabb (this could turn out good), WR Devin Hester, K Dan Carpenter, DEF Indy

I'll probably take a look at all the undrafted players and see who I might be able to pick up to strengthen some areas and might look at some rookies like Sam Bradford who will be playing in a generally week division (though wouldn't overtake Brees as starter). Any tips on who I should look for and who I should dump? :)

Jeremy Patrick said...

Hey Bal, I think you have a strong team. I have Wes Welker too, and though he might start off slow (coming back from his injury last season), he's going to pick up steam. I watched Ahmad Bradshaw in preseason and he looked fast and strong--might be worth a start instead of being a backup. I had Michael Crabtree last year, got rid of him because he was holding out, and then regretted it once he started playing--still, like you said, it depends a lot on what the SF QB can get him the ball. As far as defenses go, New Orleans was great last year in scoring defensive touchdowns . . .

Bal said...

I took your advice and am starting Bradshaw. I also noticed someone dropped T.Owens from their roster so I grabbed him up and dropped my second kicker (I can pick another up later I figure). Now if I use Owens as trade bait for a better back or I keep him to swap in when playing lesser teams I haven't decided yet. I think I'm keeping Crabtree and Wayne as my starters this week anyway...