This article is geared toward helping you Fantasy Football rookies (and possibly 2nd and 3rd year guys) out there. Most veteran fantasy players already know what we’ll be reviewing today even if they can’t put a name on it – or only realize it on a subconscious level.

Stop me if this sounds familiar. Your Keeper fantasy team is hovering around the middle/bottom of your league’s standings. You’ve got depth issues and holes to fill across the board. The only reason your team isn’t a total lost cause is that Marshawn Lynch is holding up more than his end of the bargain. Another owner contacts you with interest in Lynch. He starts by offering you a #2 Wide Receiver and his backup Quarterback. You obviously say no thank you. He throws in the best kicker in all of NFL football – Adam Vinatieri. Nope. So he throws in a 2nd round pick next year as well. Hmmmm…not so easy now is it? And he’ll keep throwing warm bodies and incentives into this deal until it seems like an almost impossible offer to pass up. Do yourself a favor and PASS IT UP! In most trade proposals involving the exchange of a stud for 2 or more players + incentives, be the owner getting the stud.

Why is this? Because there is a Bell Curve in NFL player performance just as there is in anything else where you gather a group of people all trying to do the same thing. For example, the average I.Q. is 100. If you gave 100 people an I.Q. test, (on average) – only two people would score above 130 and only two people would score below 70. FIFTY of the 100 people would score between 90 and 109! The same concept is happening with 100 guys all trying to catch a touchdown pass. In case you might be skeptical about this statement I brought along some numbers with me – let’s take a look.

In the 2004-2006 NFL seasons combined, the top 10 Quarterbacks threw for exactly 800 touchdowns. The next TWENTY Quarterbacks threw for 872 touchdowns. Of the top 30 quarterbacks, the top 10 (the top third) threw 47.8% of the total.

In the 2004-2006 NFL seasons combined, the top 10 Running Backs rushed for 433 touchdowns. The next TWENTY Running Backs rushed for 401 touchdowns. Of the top 30 running backs, the top 10 (the top third) rushed for 51.9% of the total.

In the 2004-2006 NFL seasons combined, the top 10 wide receivers caught 330 touchdowns. The next TWENTY wide receivers caught 455 touchdowns. Of the top 30 wide receivers, the top 10 (the top third) caught 42% of the total.

And even though I didn’t take the time to do it for the sake of this articles length, my educated guess is that this “accelerating gap effect” continues down the rankings of players which are worthy of a fantasy football roster spot (i.e. – the top #10-#20 players at any position probably scored as many points as the next 15-25 players, etc).

For the sake of my math-challenged brain I stuck strictly to TD’s scored. We all realize that there are many more factors that go into most players fantasy performance than TD’s scored but TD’s serve as a decent benchmark.

So all of these numbers can be crunched down into one thing you need to remember. I’m using RB’s as an example but the concept is applicable to all fantasy positions.

The gap between the average #4 RB and #3 RB is less than the gap between the average #3 RB and the average #2 RB. The gap between the average #3 RB and the average #2 RB is less than the gap between the average #2 RB and the average #1 RB. Let’s put it another way for you visual learners. Most owners think of their players as evenly spaced rungs on a ladder. But that’s not true. In fantasy football, the space seperating the rungs of the ladder get further apart from each other the higher you climb.

So if you’re relatively new to Fantasy Football, I hope this article has helped you avoid the use of “bad math” when it comes to assessing the value of a player. If you give up a #1 running back like Stephen Jackson for a #2QB, #3 WR, a 2nd round pick and this year’s best kicker you generally lose (assuming you are not absolutely stacked at the RB position and horribly lacking at the other positions involved), even though those 3 players may score as many or even more points than Jackson will. This is because your opponent is now getting those points from only ONE player on his roster (Jackson) and the caliber of players he gave up in the trade or more easily replaceable via future draft picks, trades or waiver wire pickups than Jackson.

Moral of the story – Don’t trade a Clydesdale for 3 donkeys. Even though the donkeys may pull a little more weight, the donkey owner has a lot more sh*t to pick up.