This is a blog entry. So, expect there'll be a lot of wandering written discourse here. I'm looking at the covers of several fantasy football magazines. Yes, we buy and read these at IDPBlitz. We like to see what type of content other services are providing.

So, I'm looking at several of these magazines and I cannot help but notice that each one, there are five of them, has CHEAT SHEET written prominently across the covers. That got me thinking how even during my very first years of playing fantasy football, I disdained the cheat sheet section. I couldn't find its place in my football world.

There were many reasons for this which I have, until now, never bothered to reduce to specifics. There are the obvious shortcomings of cheat sheets. They tend to be generic: presenting simple scoring formats only, and basing rankings almost exclusively on player numbers from the previous season. Hey I get it. No publication can possibly anticipate every type of scoring format that exists, and yet even though most purchases understand this they still turn to them on draft day. I find it baffling.

I also feel that using a football cheat sheet isn't really all that different from using one in school. A cheat sheet is a quick, and dangerous, way to do well on any task. As I wrote, it's a very rough guide at best. It won't help you recognize which offensive lines will help an average runner break out. It won't help you understand why a Chris Cooley is ranked higher than Vernon Davis. It certainly won't help you understand if that difference is 50 more yards and 2 touchdowns, or 500 more yards and 2 touchdowns. These degrees of difference matter to those who expect to win. Well, they do to me.

Worse yet, I dislike the cheat sheet because it mocks the point of having a draft. Where's the satisfaction of drafting Travis Henry at number 25 because the cheat sheet ranked him there? The guy who picks him then can't say, "I expect Henry to breakout in Denver because Shanahan always produces 1,200 yard backs. Henry has always been a tough running back --even behind piss-poor lines in Buffalo. Barring injury he's worth the 25^th pick. No regrets." Nope, that guy only gets to annoy everyone my flaunting how little thinking he did on everyone's big day by running checkmarks down a list he didn't generate or really understand It gets me thinking of that superb commercial on the NFL network where one league owner cannot seem to pronounce T.J. Houshmanzadeh's name correctly and yet remains supremely confident he's going to win the league. "Championship," he sings satisfactorily to himself as he puts pencil to paper. Meanwhile, we're all thinking "moron" in that same tone.

A cheat sheet is a loaded gun. Don't believe me? Ok, here's some information to consider. I looked at the cheat sheet from the 2006 Fantasy Football Index and saw Drew Brees ranked as the 19th best QB, Shaun Alexander, Tiki Barber, Larry Johnson, Clinton Portis, Ronnie Brown, and Rudi Johnson were all rated ahead of Steven Jackson, and Brian Westbrook was number 14. The WRs group wasn't any stranger to look at in the rearview mirror. My point is that a cheat sheet by design and nature is a failure in the absence of continuing and ongoing analysis. Where are these magazines and their guides when Jericho Cotchery or Marques Colston step up their play? At best, it can get you through a few rounds.

If anyone has won relying on a cheat sheet, well A: I'd like to meet you, B. I'd like to know if you've done that little feat more than once, and C. I'd really like to meet the so-called competition.

My apologies for noting so many offensive players, but as you know the mainstream magazines only address half of the game in more ways than one. To combat this I still prepare each season by reading the works of colleagues, following recent news, examining player trends, reading the analysis of individuals with a football mind, and looking at the hard data. I also of course create my own cheat sheet. Although to call it that demeans my work as it's loaded with small jotted comments and facts. It's got arrows, stars, question marks, if-then statements, equal signs, and "hmmm" labels to boot. To do any less is very uncomfortable for me. I honestly feel as if I've cheated myself doing any less.