Peer Review of DLF Mike's 2016-2019 RB Analysis

[Johnny Canuck]

Seemed pretty obvious that it was bravado/shtick to me.

If I walked up to you and said 100% confidently that pigs were flying, then you look up and see no pigs.

Are you gonna go: "WTF MAN, YOU SAID THERE WERE PIGS FLYING 100%."

Or are you going to laugh and shrug it off, because you already knew in the back of your head that there's little to no chance pigs could be flying. The same way, anyone who has been on these forums long enough should know that no one hits draft rankings 100%.

BUT maybe Mike H is from the future, stole the Delorean from Marty McFly, and is hoarding that 100% hit rate to himself. If you truly do believe in time machines, crystal balls, or fortune tellers, then you can be upset about the 100% thing. Otherwise we're all smart enough to know that nobody hits 100% (even if they claim to) - so why are you all getting so rattled when the expected outcome happens...

Ppl on this board clamor for bold takes, then trash posts when ppl go out on limbs...why would anyone post a bold take again after that. Even if a poster claims to be 100% accurate, we all know this is a fallacy, so just take what you can use (either entertainment or information), make your own conclusions and move on. Healthy debate is great, but the venom on here can be a bit much.

This 100% molehill has been turned into a mountain, and it's too bad because this is how you lose quality posts/posters.

Thanks for the reports DLF Mike, they were entertaining and helped augment my own analysis.

To everyone with their 100% panties in a twist - relax, it's supposed to be a fun game.

[FantasyFreak]

Seemed pretty obvious that it was bravado/shtick to me.



Ppl on this board clamor for bold takes, then trash posts when ppl go out on limbs...

Not sure the bolded part is true. The bold "take" you are referring in this case, to is a claim that he has the most accurate analysis over the last 3-4 years, which wasn't a "take", it was a statement, and I don't believe it was schtick. Right or wrong, I think Mike believes that, and that's how it came across. People simply called him out on it. Now I don't condone name calling or personal attacks, but there is nothing wrong with questioning that claim, and furthermore, it's healthy and necessary for any sort of real discussion to be backed up with facts when claims like this have been made.

At this point, I think people have formed their opinions on the issue, and it's probably best to move forward, as not much good will come of debating the intent or merits of the claim.

[Zacsby]

Seemed pretty obvious that it was bravado/shtick to me.

I see something similar happening with JT. He's going to be valued at 1.01 or 1.02 for a long time. I think he can be had for a lot less by this time next year, so there's no way I feel comfortable using a top 5 pick on him this time around.

EDIT: It should be noted that I've had the most accurate RB analysis over the last 3-4 years.

Yeah this didn't come off as bravado or schtick to me. This looked more like a trump card being played to win an argumemt. This, along with the near 100% for the last 3-4 years claim in the DLF article, seemed like legitimate claims.

Of course being right nearly 100% of the time all the time is impossible. But a 3 year stretch of near perfect RB evaluation? Highly unlikely? I honestly don't know if it's impossible. As someone who has been playing dynasty a couple years, I like to believe there are some really good evaluators out there and that with enough experience I could become one. Especially when it comes to a position like RB where the hit rates are much less volatile than QB or WR. So while his claim was maybe slightly outlandish, I wouldn't put it on the same level as "pigs flying".

I appreciate Mike and the work he does for the site and forum. Have no problem with a little bravado, schtick or even some snarkiness from time to time. We all have our days. Just don't want those things to come at the expense of his credibility.

I have no more tomato's! Y'all can find me in another thread. Lol

[joeyk24k]

All ADP data below is from DLF's ADP with the exception of 2016.

2019
1. Miles Sanders (ADP RB2)

It's way too early to call this a miss as Sanders had a very good year. However, Jacobs was the consensus RB1 and I think he's still valued as such. While the difference is only one spot in Mike's rankings, at the very top of the draft one slot can make a huge difference. Thus i'll call this a slight miss with the understanding that it's still incredibly early.

2. Josh Jacobs (ADP RB1)

See above.

3. David Montgomery (ADP RB3)

This is in line with ADP so it looks like Mike missed along with the consensus.

4. Devin Singletary (ADP RB7)

This is a hit given the ADP.

5. Damien Harris (ADP RB5)

Right along with consensus. Can't call it a hit or miss yet.

6. Justice Hill (ADP RB6)

Right along with consensus.

Mike's "Dart Throws"
Myles Gaskin - nothing
Bryce Love - nothing
Alex Barnes - nothing
Karan Higdon - nothing

Mike's Avoids (i.e., not listed)

Darrell Henderson (ADP RB4)

This looks like a hit so far.

Alexander Mattison (ADP RB8)

Looks like a miss as Mattison excelled when given opportunities.

Benny Snell (ADP RB9)

Snell looked decent but don't think we can call this a hit or miss.

OVERALL: If you followed Mike's rankings, you would've likely done the following
1. Avoided Darrell Henderson (hit
2. Avoided Alexander Mattision miss
3. Taken Miles Sanders over Josh Jacobs at the top of drafts slight miss
4. Taken Devin Singletary (although he was in a tier below the top 3 RBs so you probably would've drafted a WR over him) slight hit

2018

1. Saquon Barkley (ADP RB1)

No credit here

2. Kerryon Johnson (ADP RB9)

Mike wildly differed from consensus on Kerryon so this one is important. It's still very early but Kerryon really struggled in his 2nd year and has been injured throughout his NFL career. As RB2, Mike passed guys like Chubb, however, he also passed on a lot of players valued below Kerryon now like Penny, Michel, and RoJo. Thus I won't call this a hit or miss yet.

3. Derrius Guice (ADP RB2)

Mike only differed by one spot and I don't see a noticeable difference between Kerryon's and Guice's value right now. Thus this is neither a hit nor a miss.

4. Sony Michel (ADP RB6)

This is 2 spots higher than consensus and thus Mike was relatively high on Michel. Plus, Mike had him ranked above his teammate Nick Chubb who had a higher ADP. Thus this is a miss.

5. Royce Freeman (ADP RB7)

This is also higher than Freeman's ADP and thus Mike was high on him. Mike was passing on Chubb but also on RoJo and Penny. Even with RoJo and Penny struggling, those two are still more valuable than Freeman. This is a clear miss.

6. Kallen Ballage (ADP RB9)

This is obviously a gigantic whiff and miss.

7. Nick Chubb (ADP RB3)

Mike was very low on Chubb and clearly missed.

8. Jordan Wilkins (ADP RB14)

Mike was very high on Wilkins and probably ended up with him on a bunch of teams. This is a miss.

9. Rashad Penny (ADP RB4)

This is a hit.

10. Ronald Jones (ADP RB5)

This is a hit.

OVERALL: Mike's rankings this year were defined by the following players
1. Kerryon Johnson - neither a hit nor miss
2. Kallen Ballage - huge miss
3. Nick Chubb - huge miss
4. Jordan Wilkins - miss
5. Rashad Penny - hit
6. RoJo - hit

I'd say this was a very average year, if not mediocre, for Mike. While he avoided busts like Penny and RoJo, he also was significantly down on the one true RB hit outside of Barkley - Nick Chubb. Furthermore, "his guys" were both huge misses in Kallen Ballage and Jordan Wilkins. Plus he missed along with everyone else on Royce Freeman and Sony Michel.

2016

This year we can evaluate Mike's RB ranks versus overall ADP. I could not load DLF's ADP from this year so instead I used DLF's consensus rankings from May as stated in this article: https://dynastyleaguefootball.com/2016/ ... rst-round/

1. Zeke (ADP 1st)

Obvious choice here, not a hit or miss

8. Kenneth Dixon (ADP 9th)

Mike missed along with consensus.

9. Derrick Henry (ADP 7th)

While Henry has had an up and down career, this is clearly a miss especially given that Mike had Kenneth Dixon over him.

Other Players Mike Liked

This is as stated in Mike's writeup following his rankings.

Kenyan Drake

Mike stated he would consider taking Drake between 10th and 12th - Drake's consensus DLF ranking was outside the top 12. This is a hit.

DeAndre Washington

This is a miss.

Don't love some of this grading hit vs miss. For example, why is Sony a miss because he was ranked higher than Chubb? That means he was wrong on Chubb, but not necessarily Sony. He had Sony as RB4 from that class, which is about where he is valued today. I'd say that's either a neutral or positive rank.

Another is Sanders/jacobs/Monty. Jacobs was clearly the top RB to begin 2019, but to end the season I'd argue the value may have even tilted towards Sanders. Mike specifically said in his write up that Sanders was likely a 2nd year play. Also in 2019, Mike wasn't a fan of Monty, but admitted the scheme somewhat fit him and it was a tough rating. He was ranked 3rd in 2019 and I would imagine is still ranked similarly (a tick behind the only other guy Mike liked). Hard to call that a miss.. again that's positive to neutral.

_______________________________

I think saying anyone is 100% accurate or even anywhere close is a stretch. What I will say for Mike is that the process he uses and his general success rate has helped me evaluate RB better than anyone else on this board.

I won't go pick for pick to grade him, but he's helped me identify several players to avoid as well as guys like Singletary who have provided significant value to my teams that I likely wouldn't have drafted otherwise.

This 100%
I was planning to reply exactly this.
Especially that Mike has helped me avoid some early pick mistakes and draft singletary and others that I was not looking at before.
Just like any dynasty advice you take some and leave some. I ignored the Henry/Chubb points and have shares of both but also drafted Singletary everywhere. The meat of Mike’s analysis is in the write ups not the rankings for me. Use his great film study and decide what you agree with. No one has all the answers! Dynasty would not be fun if there was a cheat list. No rankings have ever been 100%

[OhCruelestRanter]

Mike deserves real credit for sucking it up, admitting he was wrong, explaining what happened, and apologizing. It's unfortunate that it took all this for that to happen.

Thanks, Mike.

[FantasyFreak]

Mike deserves real credit for sucking it up, admitting he was wrong, explaining what happened, and apologizing. It's unfortunate that it took all this for that to happen.

Thanks, Mike.

For sure.

[mild]

I'm sorry but to me it's no different than Brian Williams. That famous news anchor who lied about being in a helicopter that was shot down over Iraq. He was called out on his lie by people who knew better (the people who were actually there). Obviously as a result, people really started to question his credibility. Credibility is kind of important when the line of work you're in is reporting information people rely on.

http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/ ... n-williams

Free Brian Williams.

[skinfanjon]

Mike- it's cool to see you own up to some mistakes there, so legit respect for that.

Unfortunately, credibility is a fragile thing and I feel like we're only halfway home on saving some of it.

The Ballage comments...you still standing by this notion of trying to pull an okiedoke on the rest of your league? If so, I seriously doubt anyone buys it, whether its truth or not.

If you were trying to cover up a big fail on your analysis, this would be a good time to admit it. I'd be more inclined to believe you moving forward.

[cantguardjake]

Just looking at the premise of this post again, once again, it’s as if nobody read the reports. Having David Montgomery as his rb3 isn’t a miss, he blatantly said the fact that he is ranked that high highlights how poor the draft class is as he’s low on him and sees him as a rb2 - how is that a miss?

Also, everyone likes to focus on his big calls like Henderson but what they don’t mention is that he pretty much ruled out every single other running back as being not worth drafting such as Darwin, to a lesser extent Hill, Dexter Williams, Snell etc - players people were spending second to third round picks on (firsts in some places for Darwin lol).

Has he made some bad calls in the past? Yes, but overall his hits are FAR greater than his misses, you just need to actually look at the overall report - which includes his takes on the players that are now just a fantasy afterthought.

[Cult of Dionysus]

Mike deserves real credit for sucking it up, admitting he was wrong, explaining what happened, and apologizing. It's unfortunate that it took all this for that to happen.

Thanks, Mike.

Yup, for sure.

[skinfanjon]

Just looking at the premise of this post again, once again, it’s as if nobody read the reports. Having David Montgomery as his rb3 isn’t a miss, he blatantly said the fact that he is ranked that high highlights how poor the draft class is as he’s low on him and sees him as a rb2 - how is that a miss?

Also, everyone likes to focus on his big calls like Henderson but what they don’t mention is that he pretty much ruled out every single other running back as being not worth drafting such as Darwin, to a lesser extent Hill, Dexter Williams, Snell etc - players people were spending second to third round picks on (firsts in some places for Darwin lol).

Has he made some bad calls in the past? Yes, but overall his hits are FAR greater than his misses, you just need to actually look at the overall report - which includes his takes on the players that are now just a fantasy afterthought.

The biggest problem for me and I would venture to guess some others feel the same is the Ballage stuff. How are we supposed to take anything he says seriously when he claims to have outright lied to us about what he thinks of a player to help benefit him personally?

Anyone? Bueller??

[CGW]

I think we can all make our choices on who we want to take seriously. If he makes a claim about a garbage RB being the next saquon, I'll use my own judgement to ignore it.

[ericanadian]

Just looking at the premise of this post again, once again, it’s as if nobody read the reports. Having David Montgomery as his rb3 isn’t a miss, he blatantly said the fact that he is ranked that high highlights how poor the draft class is as he’s low on him and sees him as a rb2 - how is that a miss?

Also, everyone likes to focus on his big calls like Henderson but what they don’t mention is that he pretty much ruled out every single other running back as being not worth drafting such as Darwin, to a lesser extent Hill, Dexter Williams, Snell etc - players people were spending second to third round picks on (firsts in some places for Darwin lol).

Has he made some bad calls in the past? Yes, but overall his hits are FAR greater than his misses, you just need to actually look at the overall report - which includes his takes on the players that are now just a fantasy afterthought.

The biggest problem for me and I would venture to guess some others feel the same is the Ballage stuff. How are we supposed to take anything he says seriously when he claims to have outright lied to us about what he thinks of a player to help benefit him personally?

Anyone? Bueller??

So you want to be able to blindly believe anything he posts or else he’s a liar and everything he writes should be ignored? That’s just lazy. You gotta do the work, man. If you’re going to make a decision in fantasy based on something you read, spend a few minutes to fact check whether you trust the source or not.

[Sriracha]

If you take something anyone says as gospel you're doing yourself a disservice.

One thing I like about Mike's analysis is that he goes into why he has them ranked the way they are; which gives me a reference point so that I can go and discern if I agree with him or not.

JT not being a proven 3 down back, and not having the lateral agility of Swift/Dobbins is a take I can agree with and overlook because of Taylor's exceptional production in college, size adjusted athleticism, and the intuitive reasoning that a taller, heavier RB that moves faster than Dobbins/Swift is expected to be limited more by inertia when changing directions.

This level of analysis makes it easy to agree or disagree with his assessments.

[skinfanjon]

Just looking at the premise of this post again, once again, it’s as if nobody read the reports. Having David Montgomery as his rb3 isn’t a miss, he blatantly said the fact that he is ranked that high highlights how poor the draft class is as he’s low on him and sees him as a rb2 - how is that a miss?

Also, everyone likes to focus on his big calls like Henderson but what they don’t mention is that he pretty much ruled out every single other running back as being not worth drafting such as Darwin, to a lesser extent Hill, Dexter Williams, Snell etc - players people were spending second to third round picks on (firsts in some places for Darwin lol).

Has he made some bad calls in the past? Yes, but overall his hits are FAR greater than his misses, you just need to actually look at the overall report - which includes his takes on the players that are now just a fantasy afterthought.

The biggest problem for me and I would venture to guess some others feel the same is the Ballage stuff. How are we supposed to take anything he says seriously when he claims to have outright lied to us about what he thinks of a player to help benefit him personally?

Anyone? Bueller??

So you want to be able to blindly believe anything he posts or else he’s a liar and everything he writes should be ignored? That’s just lazy. You gotta do the work, man. If you’re going to make a decision in fantasy based on something you read, spend a few minutes to fact check whether you trust the source or not.

Thanks for the lesson but I do plenty of my own work. I do seek out external info too with the general expectation that its intellectually honest.

Yes, I want to be able to believe that he believes what he writes. Whether I agree or not and consider it actionable advice is a completely different category.

Honestly cant believe that distinction needs to be spoon fed to you.