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Quarterbacks | Running Backs | Wide Receivers/Tight Ends
Movin’ Up
Breakdown: The bye weeks are now beyond us. The regular season of fantasy football is almost two thirds done in many leagues. With these things in mind we realize that, minus the opportunity that may arise due to injury, the players with something to bring to the table this fantasy season are pretty much well known to all. Therefore our perspective must change a bit, leading us to look beyond just this season but to next season as well. Whether for keeper league purposes, trade purposes, or whatever other purposes may be pertinent, we’ll be taking a weekly look at players and situations that fantasy owners should be aware of in order to be on top of their game moving forward.
Josh Freeman (TBB) – If you watch rookie quarterbacks, it is usually quickly obvious which ones will be successful long term and which ones won’t. Of course there are many factors that go into the success of a quarterback, like how good the team around them is, their command of the game or their adjustment to the faster speed. But regardless, you can usually just watch them play and get a good picture of how their career will go. Some guys, like JaMarcus Russell, just look completely lost back there, while others, like Joe Flacco, just seem to take to it and, while they have rough outings, take things in stride and just keep getting better from their mistakes. Freeman appears to be one of the guys that ‘gets it’. He was lost in all the big news surrounding Stafford and Sanchez after the draft, and went relatively unnoticed, but when he got his chance he seemed like he had been ready for quite a while.
Tampa Bay is in a rebuilding mode, this is no secret. However, they have a few players on offense that have them moving in the right direction. With a solid draft next year they should continue to improve in 2010. Now that Freeman has cemented himself as the starter, he’ll have an entire off season to work on his overall game, and should enter 2010 as a very solid number two fantasy quarterback option. One of the biggest reasons I believe that is from looking at his touchdown/interception ratio. He has only had one game so far where he’s thrown more interceptions than touchdowns, and currently has a 7/5 ratio. Compared to Stafford (12/18) and Sanchez (10/17), that’s pretty good. Before you jump on it, yes, he’s played less games, but if you use that logic you then have to look at the numbers from a different point of view and note that Freeman has seven touchdowns in just over four games, when those guys have played twice that many games and have twelve and ten respectively. Again, all things point to good things in the future for Freeman.
It would be naïve to think that Freeman will be, again, anything more than a solid bye week or number two quarterback next year, but by the year after he could very well be in the mid tier mix in fantasy football performance, definitely better than a fairly large group of starting NFL quarterbacks at that point. Grab him now and reap the benefits down the road.
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Also, sorry Stray but Sanchez shouldn't be put in the same sentence as Stafford.
If anyone remembers, I believe Kiper or one of the gurus, was saying that Freeman was every bit as good as Stafford or Sanchez and was an absolute STEAL for where he was drafted by the Bucs.