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My Fantasy League and their MFL10 drafts are taking the fantasy football world by storm. If you are not in more than one by now, you’re quickly falling behind the times. Many owners love the small money of the $10 entry fee, and the chance to profit. But MFL10s are growing in popularity because of their ease, fun and their unique format.
The rules can be found on My Fantasy League’s website, but they aren’t too difficult to grasp. Essentially, a computer that plays to a “best ball” format runs an MFL10. That means owners draft their fantasy team over 22 rounds, and then leave it alone. No waivers, no trades and no setting lineups. The system picks a roster’s highest scoring players each week and contributes it to the owner’s season ending total. Whoever has the most points by the end of the season takes home to $100 dollar prize pool. It’s a stress and decision free proposition once the draft ends.
Because of the different scoring system, you can alter your draft strategy a little. It is easier to take on inconsistent players with high ceilings since you don’t have to guess which week they’ll break out. Any dud weeks won’t be counted and hurt you, if you draft right. The best way to do so is to pair this type of player with a heavy volume, established producer. Likewise, you can take a so-called “boring veteran” and marry them with a high-upside splash player in the later rounds.
By protecting yourself in this way, you set your team up to have the best lineups each week. You’ll be getting the best of both worlds. Creating a perfect pair allows you to get the high-upside player’s big weeks, with the reliable guy’s floor there to protect you.
Wide receiver has plenty of candidates to breakout, and just as many steady contributors. Here are four perfect pairs of both to stack and create lineup advantages for your MFL10, best ball team.
Cordarrelle Patterson (4th round) and Marques Colston (7th-8th round)
The book on Cordarrelle Patterson is that he’s hardly even a wide receiver yet. His route running inconsistencies lead some observers to believe he’s still too unrefined a player to go so high in fantasy drafts. The original premise of that argument is flawed to begin with, even if his ADP is rather high. If you’re a believer in Patterson, and want him on your fantasy team, you’ll have to take the early plunge. I’m confident he will meet expectations this season, and could easily exceed them.
In a worst-case scenario, the Vikings’ second year receiver fits well in a best ball league. He’ll factor into your lineup when he goes off, but won’t hurt you if he or the Minnesota offense lays a dud. Patterson has the sheer athletic ability to put up a dominant fantasy effort any week. He did it a few times to close the 2013 season. But if he indeed is still an unpolished player in 2014, he will be inconsistent.
The best way to protect your team from Cordarrelle Patterson’s low floor weeks is to take Marques Colston. The Saints’ veteran receiver failed to record over 1,000 yards or at least seven touchdowns for the first time since 2008—where he only played in 11 games. Some are viewing Colston as a depreciating asset, but his drop off was due mostly to injury. He dealt with knee maladies for most of the year, and he never looked right from weeks one to eight. Colston finally sat out a game when the Saints played the Jets in week nine.
After giving the knee a rest, Marques Colston returned to finish the year in epic fashion. Everything about him improved after week nine. Colston recorded 13.51 fantasy points per game, nearly doubling his 7.67 average prior to week 10. His targets jumped from 5.71 to 8.88, yards from 4.8.86 to 75.12 and receptions to 3.86 to 6. Colston’s game splits lend credence to the conclusion his performance was only hindered by his health.
Now that he’s right, Marques Colston should resume his place as a safe WR2 candidate with a low weekly floor. He even carries game-by-game upside because he plays in the Saints offense. The perceived decline in his play has his ADP at a very manageable spot in the eighth round.
Pairing Colston and Patterson is an optimal combination for MFL10s. The computer will take Patterson on weeks he dominates the competition. Should he still have some poor performances—due to himself or his quarterbacks—you will have Colston’s solid games to fall back on.
Brandin Cooks (6th round) and Eric Decker (7th-8th round)
The Saints rookie receiver is all the rage right now. According Fantasy Football Calculator, Brandin Cooks’ ADP has risen from 8.09 to 6.08 in just a month. Barring a disaster, do not expect that to go anywhere but up. He’s yet another player that if you believe in his upside, you’ll have to pay a premium for it. If he inherits a good portion of Sproles’ role and carves out his own, his explosiveness in the hands of Drew Brees and Sean Payton could make him worth it.
While everyone wants to rush and get a piece of the Saints’ offense, don’t be too hasty to pencil in Cooks for greatness. We know the history of rookie receivers often being overvalued in fantasy football. Cooks will have massive statistical weeks, but he could have a few very poor point totals as well. It’s extremely likely that his target total varies from week to week.
Marrying Brandin Cooks with Eric Decker looks like a smart bet. If you’re taking Cooks at his price, you need to level out the risk not long after. Doubling back to take Decker only a round or two later is a necessary move.
The newest member of the New York Jets has a more than manageable eighth round ADP. He won’t reproduce the numbers he amassed in Denver, but Decker is a solid player that will be fed. The eighth round is quite low for a player far and away the best passing catching option on his team. Decker was targeted 137 times as a Bronco last season. That number might drop a little, but not by much. Geno Smith desperately needed a reliable target last season, and he knows he has one in Decker. You can still expect him to carry the volume he needs to succeed.
Decker isn’t as safe as other protection options on this list. Yet, he still presents a nice seasonal floor for an eighth round pick. One of the worries with him is how he will fair against top cornerbacks, particularly Darrelle Revis another new member of the AFC East. Brandin Cooks could actually do a little recuse job for his protector here. The Jets take on the Patriots in weeks seven and 16. That means when Decker is visiting Revis Island, Cooks will face the woeful Detroit and Atlanta secondaries. Add in the fact that both games figure to be Saints’ shootouts, and it could mean big weeks for Cooks.
Brandin Cooks and Eric Decker is a perfect pair that should help each other out. Decker presents a safe target floor to count on, while Cooks has more potential to go off. Cooks’ matchups during Decker’s Revis weeks are a tasty bonus.
Larry Fitzgerald (4th round) and Justin Hunter (10th-11th round)
It’s hard to name many wide receivers that have been better than Larry Fitzgerald over the past decade. At one point, he was annually a top three NFL pass catcher. However, his numbers have dropped off the last two seasons.
In 2012, Fitzgerald had to suffer through some of the worst quarterbacking ever seen. A skeleton crew couldn’t get he ball to him, and he only recorded 71 receptions on a whopping 153 targets. Last season, Fitzgerald’s receptions bumped back up to 82 on nearly 20 fewer targets. Yet, he still fell just short of the century mark in terms of receiving yards. The Pro Bowler caught ten touchdowns, but the big plays came with less frequency.
It might be slow and slight, but a decline does seem to be looming for Larry Fitzgerald. That doesn’t mean he’ll be unusable for fantasy football, it just means things will change. Recall that now Cardinals’ head coach, Bruce Arian, took a player at a similar impasse in Reggie Wayne and revitalized his role in 2012. Arians could take a similar approach with Fitzgerald. This means he will lessen his load by making the wide receiver a slot player who runs more tertiary routes. That plan will provide a steady output of solid fantasy outings, but might hinder his amount of explosive games.
To combat a lack of upside with Fitzgerald, you take a player like Justin Hunter later on. While he is still a very incomplete product, there aren’t many human beings like Hunter on this earth. Prior to tearing his ACL in college, some even compared him to a young Randy Moss. That is intense praise. There were times as a rookie it didn’t look like Hunter had lost an ounce of that ability.
Hunter has the physical ability to run wild on a defense. He could post a seven catches for 100 plus yard and two scores line any day. His own inexperience coupled with a Jake Locker shaped question at quarterback means he could post a goose egg just as easily. Hunter also didn’t get much time with Locker, as they only played five games together.
Justin Hunter could certainly frustrate fantasy owners who are counting on him in 2014. In an MFL10, you can structure it so you do not have to. This perfect pair gives you a great player with a safe, reliable weekly output in Larry Fitzgerald. He’ll more often than not be the player whose score the system takes. On the weeks when Justin Hunter looks like young Randy Moss, your teams gets a nice added kick.
Reggie Wayne (7th round) and Kelvin Benjamin (9th round)
As mentioned in the previous section, Reggie Wayne has changed his game. He used to be a stud, scare the defense type of receiver in Peyton Manning’s aerial assault. While still a good player, he’s morphed into a reliable, move the chains player for Andrew Luck to count on.
While his new role and age have closed the book on him approaching WR1 upside, he still produces. Wayne put up 38 catches, 503 yards and scored twice in seven games before being lost for the season to an ACL injury. If you extrapolate those numbers over 16 contests you get just about 89, 1,150 and five. The touchdown number is low, but those are still fine WR2 or WR3 numbers—especially in PPR.
So why is Reggie Wayne going later in fantasy drafts? Most are concerned with the prospects of a 35 year old returning from an ACL repair. Yet, every single report coming out of Indianapolis’ training camp regarding Wayne has been glowing. Without exception observer have stated he looks good as new, and is tearing up coverage in critical situations. Lately it hasn’t taken quite as long for NFL players to come back from an ACL tear. Theoretically, the injury shouldn’t affect a player like Wayne, who hardly uses speed in his game these days, very much.
While Wayne won’t win you weeks in standard leagues, his floor is enticing in an MFL10. Especially when you pair that with a player like Kelvin Benjamin. Wayne may not see much of the end zone anymore, but the Panthers’ rookie may live there. His 6’5 and 240 pound frame is conducive to winning jump balls that lead to touchdowns. Cam Newton has never played with anyone who possesses that skill, and by all accounts he’s enjoying throwing it up to Benjamin.
Even if Kelvin Benjamin isn’t a good player right away he could still score double-digit touchdowns. That was the belief all offseason, but Benjamin’s preseason debut showed he’s capable of more. He looked nothing like the raw player many expected. He did catch one long touchdown, but more importantly he played physical and looked much more agile than he did at Florida State.
There are no sure bets with Carolina’s number one receiver, regardless of how improved he looks. Being that he is a rookie on an offense that isn’t likely to be very prosperous, Benjamin will have low scoring weeks. That’s where the best ball format, and a player like Reggie Wayne can save you. Wayne will get the nod by the computer when Benjamin succumbs to double coverage, or has a mistake-ridden game. When Cam Newton feeds him multiple touchdowns in an afternoon, you’ll be happy when the system adds it to your total.
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