Most Likely to Succeed

It is becoming a cliche, but fantasy dominance is not about drafting the consensus #1 player in the sport or at a specific position. It doesn't take intelligence to figure out that LaDainian Tomlinson is the best player in fantasy football. What does take a certain amount of hard work is figuring out which players are likely to outperform their historic baselines.

Now, my good friend DB was kind enough to enlighten us to his beliefs on roster building - specifically, that deciding exclusively to draft good value picks can lead to a lot of good value, but an incomplete roster. So, getting a replacement level fantasy performer for $1 in a draft is great when you project out what you're getting for your $1, but when you can't find a solid player to plug into your final two roster spots, you're in trouble.

When we named this blog "Most Likely to Succeed," we did it because fantasy sports are not about being right or wrong in an absolute sense. They are about putting yourself in a position to be right or wrong most of the time. If you have identified three players who you feel are potential breakout candidates, that doesn't mean they will breakout. This year, players like Jeff Francoeur, Robinson Cano, and Chris Young (OF), are proof of the belief that players primed for big years do not always have them. But for every Chris Young there's a Matt Kemp, for every Robinson Cano there's an Ian Kinsler, and for every Jeff Francoeur there's a Carlos Quentin.

Now I'd like to be able to tell you that I can identify which players are poised for huge breakouts and which aren't. I'd like to be able to say that every team of mine this year featured Quentin, Kinsler, and Kemp instead of Young, Cano, and Francoeur - but that's just not true. What is true is that these players - some of them taken early in drafts, some taken later - are more fundamental to fantasy success than guys like Alex Rodriguez and Albert Pujols.

So, with all that said, I want to unveil my key to success in this year's football season: Andre Johnson. Now, you might look at this page and say that predicting Andre Johnson's success takes no real skill - but I see his average draft position and rankings relative to other wide receivers, and I see incredible value.

Consider this - last year, Andre Johnson missed weeks 3-9 due to injury. His quarterback, Matt Schaub, missed weeks 14-17. That means that Johnson and Schaub were on the same field only 5 times all of last season (week 10 was a bye). In those five games, Andre Johnson averaged 6 receptions, 107 yards, and 1 TD.

I'm not going to promise that Andre Johnson is going to catch 93 balls for 1712 yards and 16 TDs this year (those are his statistics with Schaub extrapolated over a 16 game season). What I am going to promise is that those statistics make me much more exicted about Johnson's relative value as a borderline 2nd/3rd round pick than almost anyone else surrounding him in draft rankings.

So, is Johnson going to end this season as the #1 WR in fantasy football? Probably not. But, what Andre Johnson will do is provide as much upside as anyone in all of football at very reasonable value.

What are your thoughts on potential breakout stars this year? Leave something in the comments section if you're liking what you've read so far.