This will be my final column of 2018 as I will be traveling next week, so I wanted to give you a bit more than usual this time.
Anyone who has read me before knows that I have an issue with so-called fantasy experts. Indeed, some fantasy guy who promises “to make you a smarter fantasy… player and a much dumber person” played in the inaugural NFBC league. He finished in the bottom 10 out of 195 teams and has not played again since. Yet, you can watch him giving fantasy advice weekly. Go figure.
Stephen A. Smith is not a fantasy expert. I doubt that he is a football expert in any sense of the term. In fact, I don’t think he knows a whole lot about anything, especially football. By now, you’ve likely already heard his rant about the Chargers/Chiefs game last Thursday. In case you didn’t, you can watch it here.
On “First Take,” Smith spoke about Spencer Ware, explaining that he was looking forward to seeing the running back play. Give Smith a break, as perhaps he didn’t know that Ware was listed as doubtful for that evening’s game. That one was excusable.
However, confounding his lack of knowledge, Smith went on to say, “I’m also looking at the San Diego Chargers on offense, and I’m thinking about Hunter Henry and the way that he’s played this year and as effective as he’s been,” Smith said. “He’s going up against Derrick Johnson, and I’ve got to keep my eyes on that.”
Fantasy players, indeed NFL fans, know that the Chargers are in Los Angeles. We all know that Hunter Henry hasn’t played a down all year and those of us who have heard of Derrick Johnson know that this gentleman last played for the Chiefs in 2017 and was cut by the Raiders after six games.
OK, it’s one thing to talk about wanting to see Hunter Henry go up against Derrick Johnson, but it’s an entirely different thing to say that Henry has been “effective this year” and going up against Johnson. I guess Henry’s been really effective watching the Chargers, in Los Angeles, prep for the playoffs. Henry might even join the active squad in the playoffs, but there’s no way that he’s been “effective” this year.
To make matters worse, Smith didn’t even own up to his mistake the way we’d expect an expert to do so. Look, I’ve made numerous mistakes over the years writing here at Creativesports. Sometimes my research is wrong. Sometimes my memory fades, and sometimes I’m just downright wrong. Remember, I drafted Le’Veon Bell this year and bragged about what a steal I got. You can’t get much more wrong than that, unless of course your name is Stephen A. Smith and you’ve channeled 2017 and want to watch Hunter Henry playing for San Diego.
Back to Smith’s excuse. The erstwhile personality claimed that, “It’s called a MISTAKE because I was think of Virgil Green, but mentioned Hunter because I was multi-tasking. That’s what happens when you’re doing a thousand things.”
Virgil Green effective? Perhaps Stephen A. has a different definition of effective than the rest of us. Prior to the Chief’s game, Green has one target and zero catches in the past three games. The Green that Stephen A. just had to keep his eyes on caught two passes for nine yards against the Chiefs, without the aforementioned Johnson.
I understand the difficulty of multitasking. We all do it daily, and occasionally we mess up. I have a hard time listening to my wife while I’m watching a football game. Ok, truth be told, I have a hard time listening to my wife, period, but that’s more of being married for a couple of decades than multitasking. Then again, I rarely, if ever, enter a time machine while multitasking. Then again, I’m not Stephen A. Smith.
The Chargers (the Los Angeles Chargers who play their home games in Carson, California) ribbed Smith in a good-natured way, updating their injury list via twitter, as follows, “UPDATE: LaDainian Tomlinson, Dan Fouts and Lance Alworth are all OUT for tonight.”
For those of you with a Stephen A. knowledge of football and confuse those three with Virgil Green, Tomlinson retired in2011, Fouts retired in 1987, and Alworth retired back in 1973.
I realize that the E in ESPN stands for entertainment, and Smith is on the air for entertainment, not for his football knowledge. Thankfully. And, he is entertaining, often for the wrong reasons, but entertaining all the same.
That was a long preamble to my point this week. ESPN experts, like other experts are really not any different that you and me (except for the access to the Smith Time Machine).
Today, with Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, the NFL RapSheet (which has an uncanny reputation for inaccuracies), The Athletic (an amazingly great site), and hundreds of fantasy and sports sites, there’s really no inside information.
With Pro Football Focus and a myriad of other statistical analysis sites, the same information that the so-called experts rely upon is is available to the casual player.
Keep your proverbial “grain of salt” handy when reading any so-called expert report, and if given the chance ask those claimed experts what league they are playing and how they did. Industry leagues are entirely different from national competitions and entirely different from your home leagues.
Read everything, analyze everything, and at the end of the day, make your own decisions. You know more about your team and your league than any so-called expert.
While you’re at it, if you want some advice from this non-expert (who has had a modicum of success this year in national competitions and DFS), don’t play Hunter Henry this week, stay away from Spencer Ware, refrain from using Derrick Johnson in an IDP league, and even though Stephen A.was apparently looking forward to watching him, avoid the urge and leave Virgil Green on your waiver wire. Finally, as beautiful San Diego is, don’t bother heading south as the Chargers will be in Carson this Saturday hosting the Ravens.
Happy holidays and don’t blink.
Buster
