Who Is The Better Fantasy Team, Most Points Or League Champion?
It is becoming one of the fantasy football debate of the ages. The question that was brought up to me a few weeks ago and really for several years now. That question is, overall at season's end is the best team in a league the team that put the most points or the league champion . Lets cover both arguments, but cover what makes a great fantasy team over a full season first.
Managers must make critical decisions from the draft to the championship game. These decisions can be easy, but most are difficult and many can be game breakers. Those decisions involve who to draft, when to draft them, and other draft related philosophies. Then during the season tough calls are made every week like who to start and who to pick up in free agency. Even who you have to cut is normally tricky. Add in trade decisions and being a fantasy football manager is a tough gig and winning a championship is even tougher over the span of a long season.
Now let's dive into each argument.
For most points theory, its an easy theory to argue. If by the end of the season you have the most points in the league, you are crowned the best overall team. The supporters of this theory say that you score the most points because of skilled drafting, free agent work, starting the right players, and making great trades. All correct and valid.
On the side of the championship team, it's a 16 week grueling marathon season that at the end you are the last man standing. Not only did you battle the H2H matchups with injuries and BYE weeks, but you managed well enough to win the championship. Obviously, if you win the title you drafted a good team and you were great in free agency.
I support a combination theory that the team with the championship ring and a whole lot of points ( but possibly not the most) is by far the best team in the league and here is why.
1. For those who support that most points defines you as the best overall team have to realize that injuries have a bigger impact on total points than they do a league champion. For example, a manager loses Brian Westbrook for 3 weeks and replaces him with Michael Pittman. We will say he loses a total of 35 points over the 3 weeks, but he still makes the playoffs and wins the championship. Injuries won't necessarily keep you from making the playoffs, but they will kill your point totals. No matter how good you are at free agency you cannot replace a Westbrook, Gore, Barber, or Fitzgerald. This argument alone defeats the theory that most points alone determine the league champion. a manager can win the championship, but because of injuries lose the points title by a narrow margin. Injuries have nothing to do with a fantasy team or a manger's decisions.
2. Some teams have great matchups throughout the season that add on points or have players that get lots of junk points. Normally when you have a team full of junk point players or great matchups all the time you are going to put up inflated points. From my point of view if you have great matchups consistently with many starters on your team and you win every so often 140-90, that really doesn't give you any further advantage towards a championship than winning 100-90. Don't get me wrong, each manager wants the most points possible (especially if most points is a tiebreaker), but if you live on big performances, you die on poor performances. Ronnie Brown might put up 5 TDs in a game giving you an explosion of points, but its only going to happen once in a season, and those go down as "freak" points.
3. Consistency is the key to winning fantasy football. Give me a consistent scoring team any week over a team that is inconsistent, but explosive. I'll take the 11-5 championship team that scores 100+ points every week over the team that finished 10-5 with the most points, but scored less than 100 points when it mattered.
In most leagues the points leader will also win the championship, so in those cases the point is mute. However, the guy who puts up the most points are not automatically crowned the leagues best team just because of that alone. It's ludicrous to think that with football in 2008 that points are anything else then a means to an end. Case in point, last year if you had Tom Brady as your QB, you were probably in the running for most points. That being said, allot of Brady owners were eliminated in the playoffs the week Brady faced 30+ MPH swirling winds. That is where a high scoring team loses. He had most points, but as soon as that team failed to put up the big numbers it lost and lost when it mattered the most. Last year I had the second best team in my money league and I faced the Tom Brady/LT-powered top team in the league and beat him to go to the league championship during that windy week. He finished with most points nipping me by less than 100 points in a league where we scored over 2200 points. I went on to win the championship. We had the debate who had the better team. I said all season his team was a one man team with Brady. Compared to mine, if you exchange that one player I easily beat your team nearly every week and in total points for that matter. During week 15 in 2007 that happened and I crushed him. The point there is just because you have most points doesn't mean you'll win every week or that you have the best team. It just means you scored the most points. Its a great feat to accomplish, but cannot be the definition of the league's best team. Let's be honest, most point leaders do have that freak player like Faulk, Manning, Brady, or Terrel Davis that's gives than the "freak" points for most points and nothing else.
The league's best team is clearly the league champion with strong point totals, and that is final. Those who think differently are guys who choked late in the season or in the playoffs and because of their league high point totals hang onto the thought that they are still the best and everyone else is second fiddle. I don't think they would say that if they won the championship, but not most points.
Todd "The True Guru" Farino
Managers must make critical decisions from the draft to the championship game. These decisions can be easy, but most are difficult and many can be game breakers. Those decisions involve who to draft, when to draft them, and other draft related philosophies. Then during the season tough calls are made every week like who to start and who to pick up in free agency. Even who you have to cut is normally tricky. Add in trade decisions and being a fantasy football manager is a tough gig and winning a championship is even tougher over the span of a long season.
Now let's dive into each argument.
For most points theory, its an easy theory to argue. If by the end of the season you have the most points in the league, you are crowned the best overall team. The supporters of this theory say that you score the most points because of skilled drafting, free agent work, starting the right players, and making great trades. All correct and valid.
On the side of the championship team, it's a 16 week grueling marathon season that at the end you are the last man standing. Not only did you battle the H2H matchups with injuries and BYE weeks, but you managed well enough to win the championship. Obviously, if you win the title you drafted a good team and you were great in free agency.
I support a combination theory that the team with the championship ring and a whole lot of points ( but possibly not the most) is by far the best team in the league and here is why.
1. For those who support that most points defines you as the best overall team have to realize that injuries have a bigger impact on total points than they do a league champion. For example, a manager loses Brian Westbrook for 3 weeks and replaces him with Michael Pittman. We will say he loses a total of 35 points over the 3 weeks, but he still makes the playoffs and wins the championship. Injuries won't necessarily keep you from making the playoffs, but they will kill your point totals. No matter how good you are at free agency you cannot replace a Westbrook, Gore, Barber, or Fitzgerald. This argument alone defeats the theory that most points alone determine the league champion. a manager can win the championship, but because of injuries lose the points title by a narrow margin. Injuries have nothing to do with a fantasy team or a manger's decisions.
2. Some teams have great matchups throughout the season that add on points or have players that get lots of junk points. Normally when you have a team full of junk point players or great matchups all the time you are going to put up inflated points. From my point of view if you have great matchups consistently with many starters on your team and you win every so often 140-90, that really doesn't give you any further advantage towards a championship than winning 100-90. Don't get me wrong, each manager wants the most points possible (especially if most points is a tiebreaker), but if you live on big performances, you die on poor performances. Ronnie Brown might put up 5 TDs in a game giving you an explosion of points, but its only going to happen once in a season, and those go down as "freak" points.
3. Consistency is the key to winning fantasy football. Give me a consistent scoring team any week over a team that is inconsistent, but explosive. I'll take the 11-5 championship team that scores 100+ points every week over the team that finished 10-5 with the most points, but scored less than 100 points when it mattered.
In most leagues the points leader will also win the championship, so in those cases the point is mute. However, the guy who puts up the most points are not automatically crowned the leagues best team just because of that alone. It's ludicrous to think that with football in 2008 that points are anything else then a means to an end. Case in point, last year if you had Tom Brady as your QB, you were probably in the running for most points. That being said, allot of Brady owners were eliminated in the playoffs the week Brady faced 30+ MPH swirling winds. That is where a high scoring team loses. He had most points, but as soon as that team failed to put up the big numbers it lost and lost when it mattered the most. Last year I had the second best team in my money league and I faced the Tom Brady/LT-powered top team in the league and beat him to go to the league championship during that windy week. He finished with most points nipping me by less than 100 points in a league where we scored over 2200 points. I went on to win the championship. We had the debate who had the better team. I said all season his team was a one man team with Brady. Compared to mine, if you exchange that one player I easily beat your team nearly every week and in total points for that matter. During week 15 in 2007 that happened and I crushed him. The point there is just because you have most points doesn't mean you'll win every week or that you have the best team. It just means you scored the most points. Its a great feat to accomplish, but cannot be the definition of the league's best team. Let's be honest, most point leaders do have that freak player like Faulk, Manning, Brady, or Terrel Davis that's gives than the "freak" points for most points and nothing else.
The league's best team is clearly the league champion with strong point totals, and that is final. Those who think differently are guys who choked late in the season or in the playoffs and because of their league high point totals hang onto the thought that they are still the best and everyone else is second fiddle. I don't think they would say that if they won the championship, but not most points.
Todd "The True Guru" Farino
posted by The True GURU at
4:23 AM
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