Rearview SOS - QBs

Posted 7/4 by Chase Stuart, Exclusive to Footballguys.com

For the past couple of seasons, I've advocated using a different starting point for your quarterback projections/rankings than regular end of year data. It's simple and without controversy to start with a player's total FPs (or FP/G) from the past season or two, and then make some tweaks based on offseason changes and personal preferences. But a more accurate starting point for your projections is a normalized version of the raw stats. First, we should use adjusted games (and not total games) to give a more precise picture of how often the quarterback played. Second, we must adjust for strength of schedule, because a QB that plays a really hard schedule should get a boost relative to those playing easy opponents most weeks.

Let me be clear on something: this should be merely the starting point for your QB projections. If you think a particular player carries significant an injury risk, or is going to be playing a hard schedule again, feel free to downgrade him after making these adjustments. But those are subjective questions that everyone answers differently; this analysis is objective.

Adjusted games are calculated by taking each QB's pass plus rush attempts in a game and dividing them by all of the team's passing and rushing attempts by quarterbacks in that game. Below is a list of how each QB ranked in fantasy points per adjusted game.

• It’s easy to forget, but Donovan McNabb was really, really good last year. He had more fantasy points through ten weeks than any QB the past five years outside of the 2004 versions of Culpepper and Manning. He was that good.
  
• You may have heard that Tony Romo was the Cowboys’ holder last season. Because of that, he ranks low in normal fantasy points per game lists because he’s credited with 16 games. But when Romo played last season, he was excellent.
  
• Jeff Garcia, Drew Bledsoe and Seneca Wallace and all did pretty well in limited time.
  
• Damon Huard trailed only Peyton Manning last year in quarterback rating, but that still doesn't mean he was a great fantasy player. Even when adjusting for his partial games, he still just mirrored the league average of 16.5 FP/adjusted game.

With a partial games analysis out of the way, we need to take a look at each quarterback’s strength of schedule. A positive number indicates a hard schedule.

• Maybe we shouldn't close the book on Trent Green just yet? He had the hardest schedule in the league by a wide margin, and a more difficult schedule than any QB has had the past four years.
  
• Jay Cutler was extremely lucky to play when he did. Plummer had the second hardest schedule in the league, while Cutler faced the easiest.
  
• Carson Palmer is the man. No surprise there, of course, but it’s noteworthy that he’s done what he’s done despite consistently facing hard schedules.
  
• Vick and McNabb played against pretty weak competition, and Tony Romo had it nice, too. Peyton Manning usually faces a cake schedule, but last year his opponents were right around the league average.
  
• Matt Hasselbeck faced an easy schedule, Seneca Wallace a hard one. Despite that, Wallace actually outscored Hasselbeck on an adjusted game basis. I’m not suggesting he’s the better real life QB, but I’m not convinced Wallace wouldn't be a better fantasy QB than Hasselbeck.

If we put those two lists together, we now get what I consider to be the most accurate starting point for your projections. “Value” is how many FP/G above the league average each particular QB would have scored last year, had he faced a league average schedule.

• Jay Cutler, Eli Manning and Alex Smith benefited from soft schedules and few or no partial games. A look at their FP/G or just FP would overstate how well each played last season.
  
• Seneca Wallace is the best example of the other side of the coin: looking at his FP or FP/G understates how good he was last year. Vince Young played in some partial games and had a difficult schedule, but his increases from the overall FP list and FP/G list are negligible.
  
• McNabb and Manning are excellent, and Palmer and Brees are very good. There’s another cluster of pretty good QBs, but very few real difference makers at the position. Players like Rivers, Favre, Brady and Roethlisberger ranked in the top ten in FPs, but none were really that impressive. They either played lots of games or had an easy schedule, or both.
  
• Look at Mr. Leinart. He was actually an above average quarterback last season. He ranks 12th on the list after excluding Bledsoe, Wallace and Garcia, who won’t be starting for the same team in 2007. And this was in his rookie season. His ADP is pretty high right now so he won’t come cheaply, but he wouldn't need to improve much to be pretty valuable.

Team Defense Rankings

For those curious, I've included a table showing how the defenses ranked last year; i.e., which were the "hard" fantasy defenses to play against and which were the easy ones. Just like when we rank the QBs, you have to adjust for SOS when you rank the defenses. Last year, Tampa Bay's defense against QBs looked like they were one of the worst in the league. But the Bucs faced an excellent collection of QBs, which really inflated their defensive statistics. Tampa played seven games against Palmer, McNabb, Romo, Vick and Brees, a tough task for any defense. Listed below are all the team defenses, ranked by their adjusted fantasy points allowed value, which is how many FPs per game less you would expect the league average QB to score against them than against a league average defense. The raw fantasy point allowed column does not adjust for strength of schedule, and the SOS shows each defense’s strength of opposing QBs, where a positive number indicates playing lots of good QBs.