Arian Foster will BUST

~~I will begin by expressing my gratitude for those who have continued to check in to my blog, even though my increasingly busy schedule has kept me away from most of my extracurricular activity, including blogging. I wish I could write a good full-length blog with in-depth analysis in an hour, but it is much more time consuming than that. However, I will be posting much more frequently (and probably in a more abbreviated fashion) during the season, so don't forget about me.~~

This is not one of my fancy-shmancy professional article looking blog entries, because I don't intend it to be. I am simply recording one of my boldest predictions in a while, and I wanted to have it dated before the season begins to live or die by it.

For the entire offseason, I have been calling Arian Foster overrated...

Fantasy Playoffs Preview (Weeks 11-13)

Either you're in, or you temporarily lost your taste for football. It's playoff time! Chances are if you scored the likes of Michael Vick, Peyton Hillis, Brandon Lloyd, or Kyle Orton off of the waiver wire, you are in the playoffs. If you were savvy enough to draft the likes of Arian Foster, Hakeem Nicks, Philip Rivers, Dwayne Bowe, or Terrell Owens, you are probably wearing your dancing shoes. If you happened to be like one owner in my keeper league, who happened to keep Antonio Gates in the sixth round, draft Arian Foster in the second round, draft Peyton Hillis in the fifteenth round, pick up Michael Vick off of waivers after week 1 (and right after Andy Reid declared Kevin Kolb to continue being the starter once he got healthy following the concussion he suffered in the week 1 game versus the Packers), and trade Maurice Jones-Drew for Calvin Johnson and Ladainian Tomlinson before the week 4 games, chances are you a rolling pretty damn high into the playoffs with a 13-0 record and about to destroy many league records held by me.

Whatever the case, if you are in the playoffs, you should be obsessing about your roster, potential free agent pickups, matchups of not only this weekend but also of the entire fantasy playoffs (especially for fantasy defenses), and how the 13-0 team can be upset. This is the time of year where you start your studs, but many players can be benched for other players with great matchups. Just because you have been winning games on strong performances from Brandon Lloyd, Matt Ryan, LeSean McCoy, Steve Johnson, Chris Ivory, and Vernon Davis doesn't mean you should start them automatically. This is the time of the year where matchups are more important than ever. Hopefully, you were savvy enough to stock up your roster with players having great matchups during these next three weeks. The owner who thinks he should roll with all his top players throughout the playoffs, no matter what the matchups are is likely to come away disappointed, unless your starting roster is Michael Vick, Arian Foster, Peyton Hillis, LaDainian Tomlinson, Calvin Johnson, Sidney Rice, Santonio Holmes, Antonio Gates, and the Eagles defense like the owner in my league I mentioned above. I will try to give you some advice on certain players in the playoffs to increase your chances of winning.

Unbenchable Players

Aaron Rodgers
~~Once again we find him at the top of the QB stat sheets. The Packers lost their running game, so Rodgers took it upon himself to single-handedly dismantle his opponents. His domination will continue into the playoffs, especially in weeks 14 and 15 against the Lions and Patriots.

Michael Vick
~~There are many words to describe his season like unbelievable, phenomenal, redemption, and unstoppable. He is the second best QB in fantasy, and he has only played in seven and two half games out of the twelve. He can't be contained. Unbenchable is stating the blatantly obvious.

Philip Rivers
~~Undrafted rookie WR Seyi Ajirotutu. Do I need to elaborate?

Your Busted!

All of you should be familiar with what busts are. These are players who I predict will have a dramatic decrease in expected production, or flop altogether. Their production could plummet from factors such as bad o-lines, inconsistencies, position competition, or injuries. As the standard goes, there always tends to be at least one first-round bust every year. The first-round bust doesn't necessarily flop but simply does not perform like a first (or second, third, and fourth) round pick should.

Here are the players you should avoid in your drafts...

Rashard Mendenhall (first-round bust)
Current ADP (10-team/12-team): 2.04/2.02
Primary Causes: fumbles, passing game, Jonathan Dwyer
~According to the above ADP, he is a second round draft pick on average. However, he is late first-round consideration in pretty much every draft everywhere, and he has been drafted in the first round of every mock draft I have completed so far. It was difficult to label Mendenhall as a first round bust because he finally emerged last season as the stud many thought he would be, and looked like he was going to improve this season with the Steelers renewed commitment to the power running game. A few factors will knock his status back down to earth this season: First, he had a problem with fumbles last year. That is a problem that should be easily solved, but that directly relates to another cause of his first-round bust status: Jonathan Dwyer. Dwyer's game is very similar to Mendenhall's game and Dwyer fits very well into the Steelers power rushing attack. If Mendenhall starts to have a problem with fumbles again, we could see Dwyer take some carries away from him. I also expect Dwyer to be a TD vulture, possibly seeing more goalline touches than Mendenhall. Finally, the Steelers passing game has been obliterated this season. Their top WR and Superbowl XLIII MVP was traded away--because of character issues--without any planned replacement, and