Was 2008 the year to have the fifth pick in fantasy football?

So far this season, it would seem that the later draft picks have gone unscathed while the early drafters suffered some major blows to their studs. Owners have had to make due with their depth from the middle rounds, the true test of any fantasy football champion.

A handful of consensus top picks have already missed a game or been limited. LaDainian Tomlinson, slowed by his toe injury in Week 2, spooked some of his owners out of starting him in Week 3 even though he performed well. A.P. and Westbrook owners already have to play the “questionable or not” game each week, and Westbrook sat down in Week 4.

Apparently, when you try and make things faster around here, it makes the Internet explode, and bad things happen. I’ll write that down, and, I guess, take it as a compliment that we’ve had such a large flow of traffic around at Fools lately.

I’ll try not to break anything else, okay?

The waiver wire starts to thin this week, but alas, here come the dreaded bye weeks. Every fantasy owner has probably seen how bad they can be, and they’ve fortified their teams to make up for it. Here are a few guys that might have slipped under the radar until now.

J.T. O’Sullivan, QB San Francisco 49ers

This guy needs a nickname. He just has too much punctuation in that name, so from now on, I dub thee JTO, Mr. O’Sullivan.

My apartment management decided that I was so excited about the NFL draft this weekend that they needed to shut off the hot water this morning to calm me down. That’s okay though. I’m not bitter. I’ll just take those lemons and…

…and who am I kidding? I’m going to throw them at the door of the office in protest tomorrow.

In retrospect, there’s nothing like a cold shower to make you think about who really got the shaft in this year’s draft. For these players, the 2008 draft cooled off their fantasy value:

Willie Parker. Pittsburgh Steelers.
The Steelers didn’t desperately need a running back, but when Rashard Mendenhall fell to them, they had to take him. Parker immediately enters into the twilight of his career.

If the Patriots proved one thing this season, they proved it is absolutely required for top fantasy managers to track free agent movement. Don’t be distracted by rookies taken in the NFL draft. Besides a few impact first-rounders, you probably won’t see a lot of impact to your fantasy season by anyone in the draft until 2009 or even 2010 year.

This off-season, many critical fantasy players are up for new contracts. Football Jabber provides some analysis of some of the top offensive free agents–although I suspect many of the players he discusses will stay where they are besides Michael Turner–and Draft Daddy went in-depth to rank and track all the offensive free agents. Note that Draft Daddy pulls out the Key Restricted Free Agents from their rankings and lists them below each position.

I’ll make this week brief because, frankly, there aren’t too many players worth grabbing in leagues that aren’t probably already grabbed.  Here are a few notes gathered from suggestions around the Web.  If they are available, go after them, but don’t be too hopeful that they will be there in the free agent pool.

Kellen Clemens, QB New York Jets

I have talked about him before, but if he is still available, grab him now.  He is coming off a bye week of practice as the starting QB and should have a nice core of healthy receivers to throw to in Week 11.

JaMarcus Russell, QB Oakland Raiders
John Beck, QB Miami Dolphins

I’ll lump these two together because they are purely speculative.  If you are mopping it up in a dynasty league, you should definitely have one of these two on your roster as a QB of the future.  If you are hurting so bad at QB that you don’t have tears anymore, use a roster spot for Russell he could–emphasis on “could”–have a big impact with the Raiders when they finally decide to stop bruising McCown week after week.