NFL Week 7 – Industry Expert Grading

In a week that seemed to favor the chalk plays, I would have expected the Industry Consensus picks to have a stronger showing. However, the Industry Consensus picks as a whole only finished in 17th place out of 25 experts graded this week.

Quarterback was strong with two out of the three top plays receiving an “A” grade, while the most selected QB, Carson Palmer, came in with a “C”. At running back the biggest chalk play all year, Todd Gurley, came through with exactly what all the experts expected. While there were plenty of other strong plays listed at running back such as Lamar Miller, Arian Foster and even Devonta Freeman or Le’Veon Bell didn’t hurt you. However, when we get to wide receiver is where things started to go wrong. The “chalk” plays, DeAndre Hopkins and Larry Fitzgerald, both received an “F”. While there were some good picks further down the list, if you went with one or both of these chalk plays at WR you were probably in trouble in such a high scoring week. Tight end was also a little dicey with Antonio Gates being inactive, hopefully you either pivoted to Ladarius Green or Gary Barnidge or decided to pay up for Rob Gronkowski.

Be sure to check out the season long scores for all of the experts that we are tracking at the NFL Industry Expert Grading page.

On to the Week 7 grades, class is in session!

Week 7 Consensus Recap

Each week I will recap the top consensus picks that were posted to review how they graded out. Overall a rough week for the Industry Consensus picks which finished 17th out of 25 experts graded this week. You can view who all the experts picked here.

Quarterbacks

Highly Touted

A – Andrew Luck – Garbage time stats count too

A – Philip Rivers – See Andrew Luck

C – Carson Palmer – Solid game for Palmer, but not the huge day that many experts predicted

Recommended

A+ – Tom Brady – Matchup proof, continues to be worth the high price tag

C – Ryan Fitzpatrick – Jets kept the game close so there wasn’t a chance for any garbage time production

D – Cam Newton – Typical Newton day with one passing and one rushing score, but not enough this week

F – Landry Jones – Looks like his Week 6 performance was a mirage

Suggested

F – Drew Brees – Saints went to the running game as they preserved their big lead

Running Backs

Highly Touted

A+ – Todd Gurley – Everyone had him and he didn’t disappoint

C – Devonta Freeman – Solid game for Freeman, but not what we have come to expect

Recommended

A+ – Lamar Miller – 236 total yards and 2 TDs, all in the first half!

A – Arian Foster – “A” for Arian, unfortunately the last grade he will get this season

C – Le’Veon Bell – Had 137 total yards, but no TD means only an average grade

D – Adrian Peterson – Just couldn’t get into the end zone

D – Latavius Murray – Solid game, but not enough this week

Suggested

F – Frank Gore – Only nine carries for Gore

Wide Receivers

Highly Touted

F – Larry Fitzgerald – Likely let down a lot of people on Monday night

F – DeAndre Hopkins – A rough week for the top WR plays

Recommended

A+ – TY Hilton – There is the BIG game we were looking for

A – Julio Jones – Strong pivot play away from Hopkins this week

B – Calvin Johnson – Two good games in a row

C – Keenan Allen – Still getting a high volume of targets every week

D – Donte Moncrief – Late TD catch saved him from an “F”

F – Odell Beckham Jr. – Worst game of the season for Beckham

F – Willie Snead – Had 7 targets, but only 3 catches for 25 yards

Suggested

A – Jarvis Landry – So much for not having any receiving touchdowns before this week

A – Stefon Diggs – Can you Digg it?

C – John Brown – Just an average day for Brown and the Cardinals passing game

F – Brandon Marshall – 1st game under 100 yards since Week 1

Tight Ends

Highly Touted

B – Travis Kelce – Solid game, but still hasn’t scored since Week 1

Incomplete – Antonio Gates – Did not play, hopefully you switched to Ladarius Green (A+)

Recommended

A+ – Rob Gronkowski – Big price tag, but was under owned and put up big numbers

B – Delanie Walker – See Travis Kelce

F – Greg Olsen – Olsen has been very boom or bust this season

Suggested

A+ – Gary Barnidge – Finally didn’t score, but still put up over 100 receiving yards

F – Jordan Cameron – About the only Dolphin that didn’t get a piece of the action

B – Jason Witten – See Delanie Walker

Head of the Class for Week 7

Each week I will highlight a few of the top experts for the week. Here are the experts that deserve a “gold star” for Week 7 based on their cumulative grades for all players they touted this week.

#1) Moxyball-Marcel (Score: 5.11) finishes in the top spot this week with a strong bounce back performance after finishing near the bottom last week. Moxyball-Marcel had 5 grades of an “A” or higher out of 9 selections. Moxyball-Marcel hit on many of the consensus plays with Todd Gurley, Rob Gronkowski, TY Hilton, Andrew Luck and Jarvis Landry.

#2) DailyFantasySportsRankings (Score: 4.29) comes in second place for Week 7 with 8 out of 14 picks receiving a “B” or better. They also hit on numerous consensus plays such as Todd Gurley, Lamar Miller, TY Hilton, Philip Rivers and Gary Barnidge. They also had an off the radar selection of Doug Martin (B).

#2) Bleacher Report (Score: 4.29) actually came in a tie for second place with 3 out of 7 selection receiving an “A+” or “A” grade and only missing on one “F” selection. The Bleacher Report hit on a couple off the radar selection with Danny Woodhead (A+) and Mark Ingram (A).

Study Time for Week 7

If we are going to give a gold star to the top experts of the week, we also need to determine which experts might need to put in some extra study time to pull up those grades. Here are the Week 7 experts that didn’t make the grade this week.

• Rotoballer (Score: 1.86) had an off week with 4 “F” grades out of their 7 selections. They were let down by Landry Jones and Larry Fitzgerald.
• FakePigskin (Score: 2.00) also struggled this week with no “A+” grades out of their 13 selections. Key disappointments for FakePigskin included, Frank Gore, Brandon Marshall and Larry Fitzgerald.

Extra Credit for Week 7

In this section I will look to give some extra credit to experts that received an A+ or A grade on a player that they recommended when very few other experts did. Week 7 extra credit goes to the following…

A+ – Darren McFadden (DailyRoto-Mayo)

A+ – Mike Evans (DailyRoto-Mayo, ESPN-Matthew Berry)

A+ – Ladarius Green (DailyRoto-Mayo, SportsBlog)

A+ – Danny Woodhead (FantasyPros, Bleacher Report)

A+ – Crockett Gillmore (FantasyPros)

A – Ryan Tannehill (FantasyTeamAdvice, ESPN-Matthew Berry)

A – Mark Ingram (Bleacher Report)

Overall Leaderboard

To see the full leaderboard through Week 7 head over to the NFL Industry Expert Grading page.

The crew over at Moxyball are making a strong showing this NFL season. They currently occupy 2 of the top 3 spots in the overall standings through seven weeks. Moxyball-Matt remains in the top spot, but his lead is starting to shrink following a strong Week 7 from both the second place site, Bleacher Report, and third place Moxyball-Marcel. Rotowriters dropped one spot in the overall standings to fourth place, with Razzball and DailyRoto-Mayo currently tied for fifth.  The top of the overall standings are starting to stabilize more now that we are almost half way through the NFL season.

As for the Industry Experts Consensus picks, they dropped one spot to 12^th place out of 26 experts listed in the overall standings, with a poor Week 7 showing.

Let’s see who can make the grade in Week 8!