It happens every week: you take a look at your lineup and you’re left with the question: “Who do I start with?” We all have our star players that anchor our team, players should start with no questions asked. However, there is a second tier of players on every fantasy football team whose presence in the weekly roster is determined by the matchup with the opposing defense. After defenseman and kicker, the players whose fate lies in the matchup will vary based on the fantasy coaches’ draft strategy. This article will explore goals per game as an additional metric to be used in conjunction with the study of matchups as a tool to optimize fantasy football rosters.
Goals per game are simply defined as the number of stares per game a player receives. In the receiving game, sacks are simply not an accurate measure of receivers’ participation in the game of football. It is quite possible for a receiver to get thrown the ball more than ten times during the course of a game and then walk away with zero catches at the end of the day. Looking at the scorecard would completely miss the fact that the player was heavily involved in offense and therefore has high potential to generate statistically significant results if he can turn his goals into receptions, yards, and scoring points. fancy. On the other hand, a newbie who never gets into the game and ends up with zero captures and zero objectives, who has essentially no advantages, would appear in role similar to the highly objective player if he uses only captures as a metric to evaluate the player. potential. It is for this reason that we recommend using the goals per game metric to assess your player advantages.
Please note that goals per game do not apply to quarterbacks or running backs. The beauty of this is that there is no layer of information hidden in quick or quick intents. As Rodger Clemens said, “It is, what it is.” What you see is what you get, the number of times a quarterback throws the ball is mostly his fantasy football potential. Likewise, the number of carries a running back gets is a pretty accurate indicator of his advantage.
Let’s take a look at this in action. In week 8, Wes Welker was off my fantasy football team. He was deciding between starting Devin Hester, who was paired with Cleveland, and Mario Manningham, who was going against the Eagles. On paper, I agreed to start with Hester because I liked the match better. Looking at the objectives per game served to solidify my decision. Hester was involved in 13.6% of his team’s snaps and saw 6.8% of the team’s red zone action. Manningham was involved in 10% of the action for his team and 5% of the plays inside the Giants’ red zone. So not only was there a better partner for Hester, but he’s a bigger, more consistent part of the offense. In the end, Manningham decided not to participate in week 8 with a shoulder injury, so he made my decision that much easier!
You can find a breakdown of player utilization called the utilization percentage on various fantasy football sites around the web. This metric tells you the percentage of offensive plays that are run through an individual player. Essentially, this puts all positions on a comparable level and allows you to compare utilization between positions. In addition, they introduce a statistic called red zone utilization, which is the percentage of a team’s plays in which a player participates inside the red zone. It may make sense to target red zone specialists who have a significant standard deviation above the mean for red zone utilization. In other words, if there is a player whose percentage of utilization of the red zone is very high, it may be worth an automatic exit.
Utilization metrics such as goal per game, utilization rate, and red zone utilization rate are very useful for evaluating fantasy football players. Never take the ratings you read on the internet at face value. Always question the validity and seek alternative sources of information before finalizing your decision. If you’re deciding between two ranked players within 5 slots of each other, take a look at the utilization stats to optimize your roster!