Keeper Analysis - Double-O Daddy

Matt Ryan, QB, Atlanta Falcons
Darren McFadden, RB, Oakland Raiders
Vincent Jackson, WR, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Redshirt: Mikel Leshoure, RB, Detroit Lions


4-10 / 8-6 / 2-12 / 8-6 / 7-7 / 6-7 -- 35-48, .422 win percentage in six years of action, with zero playoff appearances.  That's the sad CKL history of Oscar's Daddy, but look a little bit closer...

Throw out his first season, in which he inherited a garbage set of keepers from the deposed Tom, and disregard the stunning anomaly of his 2-12 third season, and Chad's not looking so bad -- 29-26, .527 win percentage, and three playoff near-misses.  Plus, he was voted the league's Coach of the Year in 2007.

You wore the fedora well, Chad.

My point is simple: People now think of Chad as a middling CKL coach, but he might actually be better than you believe and ready to break through.  Give the guy a chance.

Yes, he's weirdly stoic, has a slightly off-putting dry sense of humor, and drafts Malcolm Floyd WAY too early, but the guy knows football (he's an actual coach, like a real-life football coach y'all).  I think his quiet confidence gets in his way a little bit sometimes, but he's usually good about owning his mistakes, and too few people can pull off playing things close to the vest in today's information age.  But I digress...

I brought Chad into this league in 2006, and hyped him up as someone "who really knows his stuff," which is what I was led to believe based on comments his BFF Joe made to me while we were oiling the machinations of CKL inclusion.  So maybe I'm slightly miffed that a person I brought in as a "FF guy" has yet to put the pedal down and speed through a good season in the CKL.  That being said, and like I touched on earlier, Chad is not accurately represented by his win/loss statistics.  There is a good fantasy football player hiding in there somewhere, he just needs the right blend of talent on his team to coax him out of his hole.  Is this year's keeper quartet that magic mix to take Chad from middling mediocre to mighty and majestic?

Matt Ryan is entering his 5th season with career averages of ~3500 passing yards and ~24 TDs per season.  If he matches that average in 2012, it'll likely place him right around #12 among fantasy QBs, which is, by definition, a low-end starter at the position.  But with Roddy White and Tony Gonzalez still in tow, plodding runner Michael Turner sacrificing touches to explosive scatback Jacquizz Rodgers, and Julio Jones trying to make good on the hype of every fantasy football prognostication in the free world, Matt Ryan's stock might be on the rise.  Really, Ryan's fate as a potential upper-level QB1 in fantasy is tied directly to Julio Jones' ascension into the top-10 of WRs in fantasy.  Everybody loves what Jones brings to the table, so it makes sense to say that Ryan's stock is climbing as well.  That said, I personally never enjoy trying to "back door" fantasy football value... but you can't change the fact that Ryan is the guy with his finger on the trigger for an improving passing offense and is likely a top-8 (or maybe even top-5) fantasy football quarterback.  He's not Aaron Rodgers, but this a good keeper for the O-Dad.  He's still young, he's good, he has weapons, and he plays in an offense that wants to pass and is even experimenting with some hurry-up.

Another exciting keeper is Run DMC himself, the fragile yet fiery Darren McFadden.  No need to belabor what everyone already knows -- McFad's an elite RB1 when he's healthy, but he's always hurt.  You can't count on him.  But still, when he plays, he's a total fantasy stud.  Chad just needs to be careful handcuffing this asset to Mike Goodson?... and/or Taiwan Jones?... and he'll have himself another blue chip to toss around the poker table this fall.

Vincent Jackson is a player I absolutely loathe.  A flimsy knucklehead receiver who is wildly erratic.  He's like Dwayne Bowe on estrogen treatments.  In his move from San Diego to Tampa, he's looking at a possible downgrade in quarterbacking (I say possible, because who really knows how good Josh Freeman is?) and a definite downgrade in offensive system.  The Bucs are a run-first team, and just drafted a running back in the 1st round toward that end.  I'll be honest with my assessment of V-Jax: I think they brought him in to be a glorified decoy to help open up the running game and the underneath stuff.  I don't think he's a WR1 in fantasy, and I think he's only marginally WR2 material... if Chad is lucky.  Jackson's 1100 yards and 9 TDs from last season feel like the absolute ceiling for him in Tampa Bay.  If he duplicates those numbers, he's still likely only vaguely a top-20 WR.  To me, this is not a great keeper, and wide receiver is a position Chad will likely be looking to upgrade early in Saturday's draft.

Finally, Chad's redshirt, Mikel Leshoure.  Well, what can you say?  There is some interesting upside here, if the guy can get and stay healthy, and get the hell out of his own way.  Jahvid Best's brain is scrambled eggs whipped into flan, and Kevin Smith is the very definition of ordinary, so if Leshoure can beat those two out, he might have a bead on a very lucrative starting role in Detroit.  Of course, the Lions are a pass-happy team that won't support a topflight fantasy RB1, but they could give him enough goal line carries to be a big-time fantasy producer.  That's a lot of stars that need to align, but I think Leshoure is a pretty good lottery ticket, and he's better than anyone else you'd be able to draft in the 14th round, so this is a bonus to Chad.  Possible flex starter, with at least the ability to be a fantasy backup for bye weeks and/or injury.  Let's call Leshoure a RB4 with RB2 upside.  Not bad for a redshirt, and obviously better than the seven teams who couldn't manage to cultivate a redshirt candidate at all (my sad sack Pink Nightmare included).

Where does Oscar and Odin's Daddy go from here?  Well, he's one of the most difficult drafters to read, because he's wildly unpredictable and because he stays very tight-lipped during the pre-draft process.  My assumption is that his #7 overall pick will be spent on a wide receiver, given the way the board stacks up and the obvious question marks surrounding V-Jax.  But who knows with Chad?  This pick could be anyone.  Malcolm Floyd, maybe?

With a good draft, will this team compete for a Cup, or even for Chad's first-ever CKL playoff appearance?  I'd say that depends on two things: 1) Will Julio Jones experience the expected meteoric rise to fantasy godhood, and drag Matt Ryan along for the ride?  2) Can Darren McFadden stay healthy?  If both answers are "yes," then Chad might just make good on his hype from 2006 and show us that he really is better than any of us have come to believe and that he really is the guy who knows his stuff, just like Joe told me and just like I told the league six years ago.

Do it for us, Daddy!