I’ll probably be looking to move one of my stud QBs, Brees or Newton, during the offseason.
Congrast to Hamlet, maybe now we can take a few weeks of hiatus on all the cursed talk.
In an odd way, Stringer, I think you lucked out that things turned out the way they did for us. I mean, we lost in week 16, and that sucks, and we’re both dissapointed. But if we’d both gone to the championship game as expected, I’d have beat you again, and I suspect you’d have found that even more dissapointing even though it would’ve been a better ranking overall.
So anyway, I forgot if I mentioned it, but it was mentioned that Trent Richardson was playing all year with broken ribs. I was very critical of his performance for the season, but he ended up putting up pretty useful fantasy numbers, in an archaic offense, with awful playcalling which invariably tipped off the defense when he was going to run, with broken ribs, after late offseason knee surgery. #7 RB overall.
So now he gets Norv Turner, who for all his failure as a head coach is generally agreed to be a good offensive coordinator and very friendly to running backs. And he gets to come back healthy. I’m optimistic that Richardson is going to rape all of you in the face next year.
I’ve had a few weeks to enjoy my victory (sans face raping, though), and, like all the great football players and coaches, I’m already looking forward to next year.
I, and apparently many draftniks from my little bit of research, are not so enamoured with the skill position players available in the 2013 NFL draft. Last year, we all knew who the first three players drafted were going to be (Luck, RGIII, Richardson), but this year, it seems to be a crapshoot. QB’s always rise in the rankings as we get closer to the draft (desperation, not talent, to my eyes), but is anyone really salivating over drafting Geno Smith? Is Matt Barkley grabbing you? How about that huge quagmire of similarly situated WR’s, with no clear talent up there, wanna draft one of those guys (Keenan Allen who? Courderoy Patterson of whatever his name is?) With Lattimore injured, who’s your must have RB? Ball? Lacy? Taylor?
There’s a buttload of talent on both the offensive and defensive lines and some great pass-rushers, but nobody is really jumping out at me as must have draftable skill position players in this year’s draft.
I think it’s a good draft to be drafting late.
I think, in hindsight, that Turner’s vaunted RB production has been a function of the players he coached, and not his coaching. I could have drawn up a 2,000 yard rushing attack with Emmitt, LT or Steven Davis.
ETA: Montee Ball shall be mine. Unless the Falcons draft somebody to replace Turner the Burner.
I think Emmitt Smith is as much a product of a good offense and good coaching as anything. I haven’t seen that much of him (I wasn’t really much of a football fan until after he retired) but he never strikes me as a supremely talented runner, just a guy in a good offense who was pretty good and managed to stay remarkably healthy. LT, on the other hand, is one of the all time greats in terms of talent.
I’m hoping Richardson’s struggles this season were the understandable broken ribs and knee surgery more than any lack of talent. In any case, history has proven giving Norv a very talented running back, he’ll use him effectively, and that’s all I need for Richardson to score 800 points next year.
Don’t underestimate how bad Brad Childress and Pat Shurmur were for designing a running game. It didn’t use the strength of our linemen very well, and it was always tipped off by formation and personel. I could tell you with about 75% accuracy when there’d be a run, so you know the DC of the other team could too. It’s amazing that Richardson was such a useful fantasy asset given the situaton he faced this year.
This year’s draft is really short on offense. No first round RBs, maybe 1-2 WRs at most. It’s all linemen and defense. I mean we’re looking at guys like Eifert who would be pretty mundane in most drafts possibly being one of our top 2 or 3 picks.
Good time to be picking last.
But you’re absolutely right. Does Geno Smith really excite anyone? I suppose Eddie Lacey could get you going, or take a big chance on Tavon Austin or Cordarelle Patterson, but I think depth is going to be helpful this year.
Tell me about it. I was watching some of the ESPN coverage over the last few days and I can count on one hand the number of offensive guys they’ve mentioned.
Bad time to be picking second 
If Montee Ball ends up somewhere good, Ellis will do okay, but I’m screwed.
A bit off topic, but does everyone want to keep the same online draft format that we used last season? I’m 100% in support of that. With my new work schedule, I will probably have to cut my football leagues down, but I certainly want to stay in this league.
I do have Cam Newton available for trade, I want a good RB or a WR in exchange.
I definitely want to do it again. It was much more fun than a live draft that would be over in 15 minutes. It made me feel like I had a real draft strategy instead of just blindly picking guys that I hoped would be good after all the guys I really wanted were taken in round 1.
I’m down with the same in-thread draft format we did last year.
Me too. Come to me, Eddie Lacy.
Bring me my Johnathon Franklin.
Any idea when we want to start the draft this year, I’m in favor of perhaps an August 12 or so start date. I certainly want to see some preseason action, although I think this might be the toughest draft for fantasy dynasty that we’ve had since the league inception.
Aug 12 seems way too early. What’s the rush? It only takes us like a week to finish it. We should wait till after the third preseason game I think. Didn’t we do that last year?
Checking this thread, the cuts were due on August 15, and the draft started on the 20th when some asswipe took Trent Richardson with the first pick. This year, week 3 of the preseason concludes on the 24th of August.
I suggest a cut day of August 20th, with the draft starting on this message board, on August 25th.
September 5 is the first game of the season, will that give us enough time?
At the very least, someone needs to roust Varlos to start the thread so we can talk trades/rule changes (I don’t remember, did we have any possible changes to discuss?).
Agreed.
I’m in favor of as late of a start date as possible for the draft. I must be misremembering the start date last year.
As far as changes, since this is an established league, I’d like to establish we can trade draft picks for next season (2014) immediately, even during this draft for the 2013 season.