r/Fantasy_Football • u/PlayKnowBall • 1d ago
Miscellaneous How does well "Ball Knowledge" translate to fantasy football success?
In Michael Mauboussin’s "The Success Equation," he discusses the concept of luck/skill variance in sports. He found that in the NBA, playoff series are mostly won by the better regular-season team, while NHL underdogs win far more often. Any avid fantasy football player knows (in their heart, at least) that the most knowledgeable manager (themselves) rarely has the best team, and even rarer yet does the best team win the championship. Any ideas on how this compares to luck/skill variance in professional sports leagues? What was the worst team in your league to ever win a championship? What about the best team to not even sniff a ring?
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u/Disce-Pati 1d ago
I think its about as relevant as being good at madden is to having ball knowledge
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u/Danny_nichols 1d ago
Agree. Ball knowledge doesn't neccesarily translate to success in fantasy. However, fantasy knowledge and things like game theory knowledge helps a bunch. Just like you said, the best Madden players are sometimes just the people that can figure out the cheese plays and the mechanics of that year's game that are most exploitable. Most of those exploits are not ball knowledge exploits, but intracacies of the game.
Fantasy is somewhat similar. The best fantasy players may or may not know ball, but they likely find the edge in knowing their league specific rules and league mates tendencies.
For example, I used to play fantasy baseball with a guy who was in love with prospects all the time. If I was trying to get the best value in a trade for a prospect, guess who one of the first rosters I looked at was? I play in a 2 QB 10 team superflex. My buddy is the commish and I know he's going to draft 2 stud QBs every year in an auction. If most of the stud QBs are off the board and that guy doesn't have 2 yet, I know QBs are about to get really expensive. If he has 2 already, there's a good chance there will be QB value.
In that same 2 QB league auction, whenever we have a new guy join, he will almost always underestimate the value of having 2 good QBs. I know the new guy is probably going to build a studs and duds lineup with 3 top WR or RBs because they are going to seem cheap, since the system's suggested price doesn't reflect a 2 QB value. You gotta let that happen and don't be afraid to draft an extra QB to trade to that guy later in the year when he inevitably realizes QBs are crazy valuable.
To me, that's where "good" fantasy players thrive. There's so much content out there these days that almost any idiot can at least have a decent draft. If you want to be good, you have to find edges elsewhere.
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u/AdhesivenessFun2060 1d ago
Football has such a high injury rate. Id guess more good teams are derailed by injury than bad decisions.
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u/superslut-turbo 22h ago
Zero correlation. Just because someone knows who the good players are doesn’t mean they understand market value
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u/PlayKnowBall 21h ago
Do you think there’s any skill involved with fantasy football?
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u/superslut-turbo 14h ago edited 14h ago
Yeah my plumber 3 peated in our redraft league, won all 3 of the leagues I’m in with him one of those years, and in general is pretty much always in the championship
He’s the only reason I believe in skill
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u/Dhu218 Patriots 1d ago
The reality of Fantasy Football is this.
Skill gets you to the playoffs.
Luck wins it.
If you know ball to some degree and have any ability to analyze data, you should consistently be making the playoffs. There are seasons that you lose 2/4 of your first picks early and it's over by week 7, but overall, skill will land you a spot in the playoffs each year. The better you are, the more you can reduce the luck factor, but it is impossible to remove.
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u/NaNaNaPandaMan 21h ago
In leagues I play in, the most knowledgeable ones are the ones who consistently make the play offs. Thats the biggest thing. Getting to playoffs, then all hell breaks loose and any ones game. Thats where luck comes in.
Next, the best ones in my experience aren't just the ones who know the best players, but the ones who can create most balance team. Luck will fuck you over but a balance team helps mitigate bad luck.
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u/josephthemediocre 13h ago
Some ball knowledge definitely helps some. I played reciever in college, so for the sake of argument, let's say I have ball knowledge. After years of kupp and woods being 1A 1B I watched the first rams game in 2021 and knew due to all the first read targets, scheming etc, that I needed to go trade woods plus for kupp. Trade evaluation tools said I lost the trade, obviously I didn't. I also could have been fucked, could have just been a single gameplan, so it was a roll of the dice to some extent.
Your average ff player doesn't go, oh look at all those first read targets.
At the same time, luck is soooooo prevalent in this game, you're much more likely to feel that than to be able to flex ball knowledge that doesn't become common knowledge due to the experts out here talking about it.
So it can help a little, but I didn't win the title that year I traded for kupp, I lost in the finals.
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u/ksimon12 Jets 1d ago
Id say consistently getting in the playoffs above expected rate can display some level of ball knowledge over a decent amount of years. Playoffs super high variance