Frigga's Fantasy Football Fridays: Week 1

Is there anything more of an exercise in futility than projecting fantasy football stats during the first week of the year?  Perhaps not, but that won't stop us from trying!  Just like last year, I'll be drawing on the prophetic power of Norse goddess Frigga to help out us Vikings fans with our burning fantasy football questions.  Each week I'll provide consensus projections for each of our Vikings players, courtesy of Fantasypros.com, and offer my own sit/start advice about each one.  Feel free to post any sit/start questions in the comments and with the help of Frigga, I'll check back in periodically to offer advice.  Last year, I responded to 35 questions over the last 9 weeks of the season and my sit/start advice over that time frame was just over 65% accurate, a good enough track record to continue I think.

This week the Vikings face-off against the St. Louis Rams.  Did I mention how much of an exercise in futility making projections is during the first week of the season?  We really have no idea what kind of defense the Rams will put on the field, but last year they fielded the 9^th best fantasy defense against QBs, 14^th best against WRs, 27^th best against RB, and the top defense against TEs.  In other words, they could be run on, and receivers could get open, but they were able to limit opportunities for opposing quarterbacks and tight ends.  Last year, I boiled down the projections from 4 of the most popular fantasy football websites: ESPN, Yahoo!, CBS and Fleaflicker.  This year, I've decided to let Fantasypros do all the work for me, since they take into account the projections from 7 different sources, including ESPN, CBS, and Pro Football Focus in their consensus.  So, let's see what the statistical experts have in store for our Vikings this week:

No surprise, Peterson leads the pack this week with 16.8 points.  If you have him on your roster, you drafted in the top 5 overall and he's starting, no question.  Matt Cassel has a pretty underwhelming projection, but there is one stat worth pointing out that I didn't include in the table above: passing completions.  Matt Cassel is projected for 20.3 completions against the Rams, but the receivers above only total 18.5.  So there are a couple of passes that are unaccounted for in all the projected stats above.   Similarly if you look at Cassel's passing yards and compare that to the projected receiving yards there are 10.4 yards unaccounted for as well.  It's possible that Adam Thielen or Rodney Smith could bring in a couple of catches and make-up for the missing stats, but it's also possible that someone on the list above is under-projected.  If I were a betting man, I'd put that money on Adrian Peterson.  There has been a lot made of Peterson working on receiving and running routes, and Norv Turner has talked specifically about getting Peterson the ball in space.  And yet, these projections only have him hauling in 3 catches for 26 yards, right on par with his career averages.  I expect an uptick for Peterson in the receiving department and I think he could easily beat his receiving projection with 5 catches for 36 yards instead.

Never-the-less you're sitting Cassel (nay, leaving him on your waiver wire), starting Patterson in your flex and leaving Jennings on your bench.  Jarius Wright shouldn't be anywhere near your roster and feel free to start Rudolph hoping for a touchdown, even though he has a tough matchup this week.

This year I'm participating in 8 fantasy leagues.  I've got a dynasty league, a full-ppr league, a massive IDP league with unique custom scoring (thanks MarkSP18 for setting it up!), and a half-ppr league with 5 other front-page writers from the DN.  I also have four other standard scoring leagues, and all of these leagues are spread out over ESPN, Yahoo and Fleaflicker.  Over the course of the season, I'll publish the ongoing progress of each of my fantasy teams for posterity, and of course, ridicule.  This week though, I'm undefeated!

If fantasy football advice is what you seek, look no further.  Post your questions below and Frigga's wisdom shall be yours.