Streaming Defenses- Week 17

Week sixteen is officially over and now it is time to take a look at our “team to stream” in week seventeen.

Analysis: This week we will take the Philly defense on the road against the Dallas Cowboys. Tony Romo will not be playing and Kyle Orton will be at the helm for the Cowboys. Orton has only thrown 15 passes over the last two seasons, so we will count on rust playing a huge factor this week.

The Eagles on the other hand have played great fantasy defense in three of their last four games. Chicago could have wrapped up the NFC North on Sunday night but the Philly defense recorded 5 sacks, 2 turnovers, a safety and a touchdown. The Philly defense does not have good numbers this year which can be attributed to time of possession. But the extra time on defense isn’t all that bad when it comes to sacks(17th in NFL), fumble recoveries(6th) and interceptions(8th). The Philly D/ST is available in over 90% of fantasy leagues.

The Pittsburgh defense is another unit to consider in week seventeen. The Steelers are at home against the Browns who have 15 turnovers during their current six game losing streak. The Pittsburgh defense is available in 30% of fantasy leagues.

Week 16 RB Recap

CJ Spiller and Chris Ivory each carried the ball twenty times in their week sixteen contests.

Analysis: CJ Spiller rushed for 77 yards on 20 carries and tacked on 26 receiving yards on Sunday afternoon against Miami. Spiller is averaging 15 carries, 79 rushing yards and 15 receiving yards over his last four games. Although Spiller is available in about 2% of fantasy leagues he is only being started in just over half of all leagues. Up next for Spiller is the New England Patriots. The Patriots rank 31st in rushing yards allowed and 24th in yards per carry against.

Chris Ivory is another back coming on strong. Ivory is averaging 15 carries and 78 rushing yards over his last four games. Ivory carried the rock 20 times for 109 yards today against the Browns who have a top ten defense against the run this year. Chris Ivory is available in 10-20% of fantasy leagues at the moment. Up next for Ivory is the Miami Dolphins. Miami is 22nd in rushing yards allowed and 17th in yards per carry against this year.

Under The Radar- Channing Frye

Channing Frye is not your typical fantasy big man but he is putting up numbers that merit roster consideration.

Analysis: Frye has averaged 14.8 PPG, 5.8 RPG and 3.2 3PM in his last five games. He’s shooting 47% from the field this season and shoots 81% from the stripe for his career. This year he’s averaging 0.8 BPG and 0.9 SPG in 27 minutes of floor time per night.

The former Arizona product has dual position eligibility(PF/C). He will hurt you a bit in blocks and rebounds but his three ball is elite at his position. He currently ranks 3rd among power forwards in three pointers made. Channing Frye is available in 40-50% of fantasy leagues.

Another interesting power forward is Glen Davis. He’s not a sexy fantasy power forward but he’s getting the job done. In his last five games his line looks like this- 7.2 RPG, 10.6 PPG, 48% FG, 0.8 BPG, 0.8 SPG. The biggest asset Davis has going for him is his floor time, he’s averaging 31 minutes per game this year which is a top fifteen mark for power forwards. He is available in 25-70% of fantasy leagues.

Most Popular Websites to Host Your Fantasy League

The year of 2013 is quickly coming to an end which means its time for another year-end post about the most popular website to host fantasy leagues.  As you may recall from last year, I wrote a blog post that compared 2011 to 2012. Feel free to give it a read if you haven’t already.

For those of you not familiar with FantasySP, we allow our users to sync their fantasy leagues in order to provide them with unique analysis and insight to help manage their teams and stay on top of player news.  Our fantasy tools will alert you of important player news, waiver trends, suggest waiver pickups, analyze trades, chart your teams performance over time, and offer start/sit suggestions.

This year I will be providing much of the same analysis in terms of the most popular fantasy hosts. This year we have over 10,000 fantasy leagues ranging from August 1st up until now and added support for two additional websites: Fleaflicker and MyFantasyLeague.  Also included in this blog post will be charts from the previous seasons of 2011 and 2012 so you can see how the market has changed over time.

 

Fantasy Websites

Making Sense of the Numbers

CBS’ market share of fantasy football games has continued to erode over the past 3 years and now sits at 4.6%. For the first time since NFL.com fantasy launched, it has actually decreased to 1%.  ESPN continues to dominate the fantasy market and now sits at nearly 50% of the market share.

ESPN is the only fantasy host to gain market share 3 years in a row.  It also seems as though Yahoo may be making a rebound and for the first time has actually gained market share.

  • NFL.com has gone from: 9.7% to 13% to 12.1%
  • Yahoo has gone from: 37.7% to 32% to 32.5%
  • ESPN has gone from: 43.7% to 45% to 49.7%
  • CBS has gone from: 7.9% to 8% to 4.6%

 

Three Major Fantasy Sports Analyzed

For this final section, I think it would be interesting to see what it looks like when three major fantasy sports leagues are analyzed to see current market share.  This includes hockey, basketball, and football.  Unfortunately baseball cannot be accurately calculated since it is the off-season.

Not too surprisingly, things remained very much the same for most of the fantasy websites.  The only noticeable difference is that Yahoo is a popular choice for hockey and basketball players.

Full Disclosure & Wrap Up

FantasySP is not affiliated with any of these websites.  We do offer CBSSports apps to fantasy football leagues, which may skew the data slightly.  However, after adding basketball and hockey leagues into the mix, the numbers suggest the impact is minimal.

The continued popularity of daily fantasy games is something that we cannot factor into market share.  Therefore, this analysis should be considered to cover “traditional fantasy sports” games only.

Feel free to comment or email with any thoughts or concerns.

Streaming Defenses- Week 16

Week fifteen is officially over and now it is time to take a look at our “team to stream” in week sixteen.

Analysis: This week we will take the Detroit defense at home against the New York Giants. The Detroit defense held the Ravens to just 18 points on six field goals Monday night. Joe Flacco recorded a 70.3 passer rating and was sacked once. Eli Manning on the other hand threw 5 interceptions in his week fifteen contest and has 25 picks this year.

The Giants have been very poor on offense this season. They rank 28th in yards, 30th in points per game, 31st in turnover margin and 31st in passer rating. Eli Manning has thrown just 2 touchdown passes to 8 interceptions in his last three games.

The Detroit defense has been playing well of late but they are an average unit for the year. They rank 16th in yards per game, 16th in points per game, 28th in sacks and 16th in interceptions. The Detroit D/ST is available in over 90% of fantasy leagues.

You may want to consider the St. Louis and Denver defenses if they are available. St. Louis is at home against Tampa Bay and Denver is on the road against Houston who are on a twelve game losing streak.