EDITED: 11/14/2014 to account for news on Arian Foster

I’ve got these rankings up before the Thursday night game for a change!

Some background on these rankings. All projections are based on this year statistics. Team-level stats are projected based on regression analysis that takes into account location (home vs. away, which is significant for some stats), team average, and the average allowed by the opposing defense. Once the team level projections are established, I distribute receiving/rushing YDs and TDs among individual players on the team based on cumulative season distribution, but I bias this for recency to account for injuries, promotions, and demotions (e.g. Knowshon Moreno still has 13% of MIA’s rushing yards on the season, but I don’t expect him to get that many this week.)

Past performance: These rankings are all about giving you as much information as possible so you can make the best roster moves for your team. Part of that information should be how well these rankings stack up with others. To help you with this, I provide some metrics: start/sit %, my average point deviation from actual, my rank deviation from actual, and Spearman’s rank coefficient (the higher the better). I also include the metrics of FantasyPros ECR for all positions, and Spearman’s rank for VIRMD’s K rankings and QuickontheDrawl’s DEF rankings. All of these are excellent resources for your week to week fantasy roster and lineup decisions. Since these rankings are based solely on this year’s stats, the first weeks projections did not go so well, but have continued to improve over the season.

Before we jump into this week’s rankings, let’s take a look at how we did last week. I finally had a decent showing in my QBs, with a season’s best 70% start/sit, outperforming FantasyPros in every metric. I also had a good showing in RB and continued to see personal bests in TE, K, and DEF, so even 10 weeks out the model is still benefiting from additional data. Both VIRMD and QOTD had better showings than me last week, though I didn’t have a start/sit less than 63% at any position, which is a pretty good week.

This week: Here are this week’s rankings. These rankings include the following assumptions about who I expect to be available to play this week.

I’m expecting the following:

Lamar Miller should be active for Thursday’s game, but may see a smaller workload. I adjusted Miller’s projections slightly downward at the benefit of Damien Williams and Daniel Thomas.

Sammy Watkins has been a full participant in practice this week, so he should be good to go. Woods and Hogan should see less work than they did last week.

Charles Sims no sign that he suffered any set backs last week. Should split carries with Rainey.

Rashad Jennings All signs point to his return this week and should reclaim the feature back role, with the lack of efficacy that Williams has shown. Williams, of course, will see a reduced workload.

Jerrick McKinnon A late addition to the injury report, but I’m expecting him to play at his normal level this Sunday.

Montee Ball will likely return this week. It remains unclear how Anderson and Ball will split the workload. I projected them this week expecting a near even split.

Ryan Mathews should return this week from a knee injury he suffered in week 2. I expect Oliver to be in the “Danny Woodhead” role seeing 5-6 touches, but I expect Mathews to be the feature back.

Arian Foster as has often been the case this year, question marks circle around Foster as to whether he’ll be available on a week to week basis, but I’m expecting him to play this week in a really nice match up for him. I hedged my bets by reducing his work load just a touch and gave that work to my boy Blue.

Brandon Marshall: With two bum ankles, Marshall returned to practice on Thursday. He’ll likely be listed as questionable, but should be active. I bumped down his expected yards a little bit and Alshon Jeffery got a slight boost.

Kyle Rudolph likely returns this week from a groin injury he suffered 6 weeks ago. Chase Ford will see targets comparable to Rhett Ellison’s and Rudolph should see a few more than what Ford has been seeing.

Josh McCown: Should retain the starting job, despite crying at the post-game press conference last week.

Shaun Hill: Jeff Fisher has decided to bench Davis in favor of Hill. I expect production comparable to Davis.

Ryan Mallett: See Ryan Fitzpatrick below.

Donnie Avery: Should return as KC’s WR2. But not terribly hopeful about any KC WR. They still haven’t scored a TD this year.

Stephan Taylor: Is looking likely that he will return this week. He will reclaim his back up role to Ellington, supplanting Marion Grice.

I don’t expect:

Fred Jackson has been a limited participant in practice on Tuesday, but reports are that it’s not likely he’ll play on the short week. Anthony Dixon and Bryce Brown will continue to see more work. Bryce Brown might be a nice sneaky PPR play.

Doug Martin: Fodder for waiver claims.

Delanie Walker suffered a concussion after a huge hit last week. He’s been sidelined so far this week as he works through the protocol. With Taylor Thompson and Craig Stevens out, Chase Coffman becomes the most likely beneficiary. I did’t give Coffman all of the targets that Walker normally gets. The remainder I distributed among the WRs.

Austin Davis… benched for Shaun Hill.

Anthony Fasano This is a boost for Travis Kelce.

Pierre Thomas/Khiry Robinson: Ingram will continue to see the bulk of the carries for NO.

Giovani Bernard remains doubtful for this week, which means that Jeremy Hill should continue to see the bulk of the carries.

Ronnie Hillman has a mid-foot injury that will likely put him out for a couple of weeks. CJ Anderson and Montee Ball are the clear beneficiaries, though it’s unclear how they will split time. At this point, I have a near even split of the carries between Ball and Anderson.

Reggie Bush He may be active, but I don’t expect him to be a major contributor. Bell and Riddick should make up the difference.

Ryan Fitzpatrick has been benched for Ryan Mallett. Mallett has done very little as a professional QB, so it’s very difficult to tell how he will do. At this point, I’m assuming that his production will be comparable to Fitz’s.

Jordan Cameron remains sidelined with a concussion.

Arian Foster reports are that he will be out this week with a groin injury. Look for Alfred Blue to get the majority of the carries. I don’t expect Foster-like yards per carry, but with a green QB under center and a weak CLE rush D, I expect Blue to have a nice game.

As always, I’m happy to answer your questions. Best of luck in week 11!