The Last Mile Problem - Data Fluency: Empowering Your Organization with Effective Data Communication - page 9

win, fantasy owners quickly realize that success often depends on studying
player and team performance data closely.
Here are a few ways that NFL fantasy players incorporate data into their thinking:
Variation in Player Performance
The best fantasy owners understand the nature of week-to-week variance and
its relationship to earning points. For example, touchdowns generally earn a
fantasy owner six points; but touchdowns occur rarely and can fluctuate wildly.
In contrast, the number of touches players receive may be a better indicator
of how much the team is using them and their opportunity to provide the
owner with points. Because consistent performance matters, successful owners
often focus on players with more stable predictors of success (for example,
touches) versus more sporadic events (for example, touchdowns).
Rankings Can Be Misleading
Fantasy football cheat-sheets offer rankings of players in every position. These
rankings mask the differences and dispersion of expected performance. For
instance, the top running back may be expected to perform 20 percent better
than the second rated running back, who in turn is only expected to score
five percent more points than the third through sixth rated running back. The
data shows that players often cluster into tiers of performance. This statistical
understanding was publicly explained by Boris Chen who stated that “play-
ers within a tier are largely equals. The amount of noise between the ranks
within a tier and actual results is high enough that it is basically a dice roll in
most situations.” This concept has been widely adopted by fantasy owners
as a player drafting strategy.
The Only Constant Is Change
The worst fantasy football owners are stuck in the past and pick players and
teams that they have relied on in the past to generate points. That is, they
fail to update their assumptions about the best teams, players, and trends.
Following the data closely reveals when certain players have gone past their
prime and when teams that once had high-scoring offenses can no longer put
up big points. Clinging to past success may be a formula for disaster because
the only constant in fantasy football is change.
Context Fills Out the Picture
Data viewed in isolation can be deceiving. Say, for example, that your top
wide receiver scored only one-half the number of points that he scored on