Let Matt Ryan Keep on Sliding
Matt Ryan won the MVP and carried many fantasy teams last year. What’s next?
Matt Ryan was the 2016 NFL MVP. He led the Atlanta Falcons all the way to the Super Bowl, and he put up ridiculous numbers throughout the season. Ryan finished 2016 with career highs in yards, completion percentage, touchdowns, yards per attempt, and just about every other measurable stat.
Ryan and the Falcons return every major offensive piece, other than coordinator Kyle Shanahan. Julio Jones is back to terrorize defenses, and Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman are one of the league’s best dynamic duos out of the backfield. Ryan looks set for another awesome season.
Yet Ryan’s Average Draft Position is just 5.09. His ADP peaked at 4.08 just after the Super Bowl before dropping all the way to 6.02 and is recently beginning to rebound again. Here’s a graph showing Ryan’s ADP over the past month using data from 12-team standard mock drafts.
Ryan is now being drafted as QB5 just after Andrew Luck, and it looks like he could still slide into the 6th round by draft day.
So has he become a draft day steal?
Fantasy owners are starting to catch on to the idea of regression to the mean. 2016 MVP Cam Newton put up monster numbers before seeing his touchdowns drop from 45 to 24 a season later. 2015 MVP Aaron Rodgers had second-career-best numbers in touchdowns and yards per attempt before dropping below his career average the next season. 2014 MVP Peyton Manning had his second-best numbers before falling off by 750 yards and 16 TDs from his MVP pace.
It’s not that MVPs suddenly forget how to play the next year. It’s just that incredible seasons require everything to go just right, the perfect storm of good health, a soft schedule, talent, and luck of the draw. Talent remains but the schedule stiffens, players leave or get injured, and luck evens out.
Matt Ryan had wild statistical spikes in last season’s breakout performance. His yards per attempt leapt from a career 7.2 to 9.3. His touchdown rate jumped from 4.5% to 7.1%, and his interception rate was cut nearly in half from 2.4% to 1.3%. That worked great last season, but fantasy owners expecting a repeat performance could be in for a rude awakening.
MVPs don’t see their numbers drop because they aren’t great players anymore. They see their numbers drop because statistics tend to regress to the mean and part of what made them an MVP in the first place was outrageous outlier stats far off their career averages.
So what happens if Matt Ryan has a more Ryanesque season in 2017?
Last year Ryan had 534 pass attempts. With that number of passes and his usual career average rates, he would’ve finished the season with 3850 yards, 24 TD, and 13 INT. That’s a very nice season but not even close to his 4944 yards, 38 TD, and 7 INT in real life.
To be fair, Ryan’s 534 attempts were his lowest since 2009. The Falcons offense was so lethal that Ryan barely even had to throw the ball sometimes while protecting big leads. It’s reasonable to expect him to bounce back to around 600 attempts this season, a significant boost. But the offense will be different with Steve Sarkisian at the helm instead of Kyle Shanahan, and it’s likely the offense won’t purr at quite its historic pace from last season.
At 600 attempts and a return to Ryan’s career average rates, we could reasonably expect something like 4500 yards, 27 TD, 15 INT. That’s a lot more in line with what Ryan did the previous few seasons, and it’s a very good year. But is it worth a 5th or 6th round pick?
Probably not.
Four times in Matt Ryan’s career, he finished as QB7 or QB8. Four other times, he finished QB15 or lower. Last year he was QB2. Which one is the outlier?
It’s highly unlikely Ryan duplicates last season or comes even close to QB2 again. He could settle back into QB8 range or even fall into the teens if the offense struggles. He’ll still be a useful fantasy quarterback, but taking him at his current ADP means passing on very productive players like Brandon Marshall, Greg Olsen, Mark Ingram, and Julian Edelman.
Matt Ryan is probably going to be “just another guy” at QB in 2017. You can find a Matt Ryan in the 8th or 9th round, like you do most years, maybe even later. Quarterback remains the deepest position in fantasy football, and only players who stand out significantly are worth a high pick.
It looks like Matt Ryan’s value may keep on sliding as you head towards draft day, and you might be tempted to take a peek. You’re better off looking elsewhere.
This article was originally produced for Fantasy Football Calculator.
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