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A Look Back At Our 2008 Top 10 Overvalued Players

In this article we are looking back at our top 10 overvalued players from 2008 and see how they performed last season compared to their average draft position. If a player finished below his ADP we will consider it a correct pick, if he finished above his ADP we will consider it an incorrect pick and we will void the pick if the player missed a significant portion of the season or finished right around his ADP.

#10 Santonio Holmes: Holmes fell in the category of players that had a great year in 2007 because of his high touchdown number which is generally difficult to match. He had eight TDs in 13 games in 2007 and only five in 15 games in 2008 which put him 32nd amongst WRs in fantasy points, 16 spots below his average draft position. Correct

#9 Matt Hasselbeck: The main reason Hasselbeck was on this list last season was because he had a career high in pass attempts in 2007. He was the seventh best QB in 2007 not because he played better but simply because he attempted more passes than in his previous seasons. In 2008, he played only seven games but his pass attempts per game were down 15% compared to 2008 and his fantasy points per game were down 42%. It is true he missed many games and played through an injury but we will still consider this a correct pick because he would never have matched his 2007 numbers by attempting 15% fewer passes. Correct  

#8 Michael Turner: The Atlanta Falcons carried the ball 39% more times in 2008 than they did in 2007 and Michael Turner had 377 of those, 125 more than we thought he would have. The Falcons offensive line really surprised us this season and allowed Turner to average 4.5 yards per carry. Turner finished the year as the fourth best RB in point per reception leagues and we have to say we were way off on this one. Wrong

#7 Chris Cooley: Our main concert about Cooley was that the Redskins added three new receiving targets in the second round of the 2008 NFL Draft so we thought Cooley’s numbers would drop in 2008. However, those three rookies combined for only 21 receptions and Cooley had a career high in receptions and yards but a career low in touchdowns. He finished the year as the fifth best TE, right around his average draft position but we will consider this a wrong pick because we overestimated the impact of the three rookies. Wrong

#6 Ben Roethlisberger: One of the many reasons why we did not like Roethlisberger was because he had a career high in touchdowns in 2007. He had three seasons of 18 touchdowns or less followed by a season of 32 touchdowns but yet most experts still ranked him as a top six or seven QB for 2008. Roethlisberger also had one of the easiest schedules for quarterbacks in 2007 and had lost his best offensive lineman in Alan Faneca. Despite the Super Bowl win, Roethlisberger fell back to his usual 17 touchdowns and his other numbers were similar to 2007 so he finished the year as the 16th best QB. Correct

#5 Steven Jackson: We said that Jackson would probably finish the year with close to 300 carries and a yard per carry average of above 4.0 but we felt he was not a top five RB because he was a risky pick. Jackson did have a few more carries and TDs per game than we expected but he missed four games with an injury and 37 of his 230 fantasy points came in a meaningless week 17 games against the Falcons. Void

#4 Larry Johnson: “ Johnson is another player who is being drafted too high because of his past and many fantasy football players fail to look at the current situation in Kansas City to realize that no one could be a top ten or even top fifteen running back with that offense.” Johnson had only 137 fantasy points in 12 games and was a big disappointment for a second consecutive season. Hopefully you listened when we told you to stay away and there was no way that he was worth a top ten pick as his ADP indicated. Correct

#3 Carson Palmer: Carson Palmer was atrocious in his first two games last season and played slightly better in the next two but he missed 12 games due to a sore elbow. There was no way that Palmer would have been a top five quarterback in 2008 with that offense but we will give him the benefit of the doubt because of the sore elbow. Void

#2 Braylon Edwards: Edwards was one of the biggest disappointments of the 2008 season with a decrease of 48% in fantasy points. We did not expect such a large decrease but we had him ranked lower than the very large majority of experts in 2008 and felt there was no way he would match his 16 touchdowns from 2007, he had only three. Correct

#1 Frank Gore: We did not understand why Frank Gore was being drafted as the sixth best RB in 2008. His offensive line was worse than in 2007, Mike Martz offenses usually carry the ball less than they did in the year before he arrived but yet most people expected him to return to his 2006 shape.  If we project Frank Gore’s numbers from his first 13 games before his injury, he would have finished with 280 carries for 1,200 yards, 50 receptions for 450 yards and 10 touchdowns.  Those numbers are very similar to his 2007 numbers and nowhere near his 2006 numbers. He would have finished the year as the eighth best RB in a PPR so slightly below his ADP but higher than we expected him to be so we will void this pick. Void

Overall – 5 for 7: Many of these players in our top ten had very disappointing seasons as we had predicted. The only player in this list that we regretted ruling out of our fantasy drafts was Michael Turner who had an exceptional season.  Overall this article turned out to be quite accurate and we hope our others will have been as accurate as we continue to look back at the 2008 season in the upcoming week.

May 14, 2008