An Epic Battle between Man and Machine

In the movie, I-Robot, Susan Calvin (Bridget Moynahan - right) realizes that by making machines that are no longer controlled by humans, the world balance will be jeopardized.   The machines she makes are governed by three laws:

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Brilliant. Right?

Well, when The Machine from Advanced Sports Logic, Inc. challenged Sirius XM Fantasy Sports Host Ray Flowers (aka The Oracle) to compete in Fantasy Football, we needed rules too.  So our rules were:

1. The settings would be set the same for all three drafts.
2. The earliest round for a position would be set based on most likely round they are picked in drafts this season.
3. Josh Rabbitt had to take The Machine’s advice for the first or second player it suggested.

The Machine is made to be used with a human so you can decide to use its recommendations in any way you want.  For our experiment that would not work.  We needed to take The Machine’s advice ALL THE TIME.The actual results don’t matter.  Even the polls don’t matter.  All that matters is that the people at Advanced Sports Logic had the guts to put their technology up against The Oracle and USA Today Sports felt it important enough to cover as part of their Fantasy Football Week in America (http://fantasyweek.usatoday.com).  There was no incredible upside for The Machine. No pundit would ever admit defeat.Read Ray Flower’s View on USA Today:  Ray Declares Victory

There is no winner now.  There cannot be.  Fantasy Football leagues are not won at the draft.  We need to play the season to see which is better: Man or Machine.

The Oracle vs The Machine completed in three High Stakes Drafts on Real-Time Fantasy Sports:

• Draft 1:  10pm ET on Monday August 26^th 
• Draft 2:  10pm ET on Thursday August 29^th 
• Draft 3:  1pm ET on Tues September 3^rd 

OK…it is no surprise that The Machine beat a human by the sheer numbers, but let’s also look at the teams from my standpoint as I have seen hundreds of drafts including drafting fourteen times this summer.  We want to look at how they can compete during the season. ..and by New Year’s Day, we will have a winner.

BY THE NUMBERS - Round 1 - August 26th Draft
The Machine		PPR	RD	The Oracle	PPR	RD
QB	Cam Newton	343	5	Tony Romo	329	8
RB	Steven Jackson	224	2	M Lynch	229	1
RB	Lamar Miller	196	3	Matt Forte	251	2
WR	Calvin Johnson	309	1	V Jackson	230	3
WR	Danny Amendola	229	4	V Cruz	230	4
Flex	Eric Decker	219	6	Antonio Brown	210	5
TE	Greg Olsen	167	9	Kyle Rudolph	146	12
K	Matt Bryant	147	15	Greg Zuerlein	133	16
DT	Seahawks	152	11	Browns	112	15
Â	TOTALS	1986	Â	Â	1870	Â
BN	Miles Austin	188	7	Chris Ivory	154	6
BN	Danny Woodhead	140	8	R Mendenhall	139	7
BN	Brian Hartline	160	10	Vincent Brown	135	9
BN	K Moreno	142	12	Michael Vick	289	10
BN	Joe Flacco	286	13	Ryan Broyles	133	11
BN	Greg Little	141	14	Michael Bush	91	13
BN	Brandon Myers	137	16	Coby Fleener	114	14
Â	TOTALS	1194	Â	Â	1055	Â
WIN	STARTERS	116	Â	RESERVES	139	Â

Ray Flowers:  Very strong draft at Running Back and the team is well-rounded.  Cruz dinged up and just signed a huge contract and Vincent Jackson puts up the numbers, but tough to do with the QB he has.  Solid at all other positions, but not stellar.  Steal of the draft is Romo in the 8^th round.  Backups are good with upside.  Don’t love the Handcuff of Forte with Michael Bush.  Like a movie without sex or violence…why bother?Grade: B+The Machine:  Taking Calvin Johnson in the first round does two things: (1) gives you a leg up on WRs of any team in the league; (2) gives you a not as good RB1.  For me, Steven Jackson will have a great year.  He carried an entire offense for years in St Louis.  Not worried about the 2400 carries.  He is fine.  It is the second RB in Lamar Miller that proves that it was taken by a Machine.   What I find to be interesting about the rest of the draft here is that it has a lot of upside: Amendola, Austin, Hartline, Woodhead.  Also , Manning said that his chemistry with Welker is not there and he would be throwing to DT and ED.  Decker could have more points than projected.  He had 14 TDs last year.  Cam Newton could put it all together in 3^rd year, so huge upside.Grade: A-

BY THE NUMBERS - Round 2 - August 29th Draft
The Machine		PPR	RD	The Oracle	PPR	RD
QB	Russell Wilson	330	6	Romo	306	7
RB	CJ Spiller	260	1	L McCoy	260	1
RB	D Sproles	233	3	Chris Johnson	211	2
WR	V-Jackson	243	2	M Colston	227	4
WR	R Wayne	236	7	A Brown	225	5
Flex	L Miller	196	4	Stevan Ridley	205	3
TE	B Pettigrew	150	10	M Bennett	174	10
K	Matt Bryant	152	15	Greg Z	137	16
DT	Broncos	186	13	Bengals	160	15
Â	TOTALS	1986	Â	Â	1905	Â
BN	Miles Austin	167	7	Steve Smith	192	6
BN	Lance Moore	166	8	Ben Tate	106	8
BN	Danny Woodhead	113	9	Ryan Broyles	168	9
BN	Eli Manning	278	11	Helu	78	11
BN	Bryce Brown	80	12	C Palmer	265	12
BN	Greg Little	142	14	S Greene	72	13
BN	Coby Fleener	141	16	C Patterson	140	14
Â	TOTALS	1087	Â	Â	1021	Â
WIN	STARTERS	81	Â	RESERVES	66	Â

Ray Flowers:  This is a near perfect draft. This hurts to say on a lot of levels.   First is that I will likely inflate an already justifiably large ego.  The second is that The Machine cannot win the draft contest here if the draft was “perfect”.  RBs are stellar with clear number 1 jobs and upside.  The WRs are good enough if Colston has the kind of year he should.  The backups are smart with upside.  One handcuff and then Ben Tate who if Foster continues to have injury woes, he could get value out of it.  Also trading to the owner who drafted Foster will be good if they split early to save health of Foster. Corderelle Patterson is a great flyer.Grade: A+The Machine:  Honestly, a lot not to like here as an analyst.  Spiller is going to get huge load for the first time.  Sproles is good in PPR, but a lot of mouths to feed.  Wayne is getting old.  Miller is unproven.  Great bench and with The Machine at the helm for lineups/waivers, Josh will be up to the challenge. Crazy thing is that the scores are in favor of The Machine.  Don’t love this, but it is playable.Grade: B

BY THE NUMBERS - Round 3 - Sept. 3 Draft
The Machine		PPR	RD	The Oracle	PPR	RD
QB	M Stafford	332	6	M Vick	293	8
RB	L McCoy	260	1	M Lynch	232	1
RB	S Jackson	241	2	C Johnson	211	2
WR	V Jackson	243	3	L Fitzgerald	267	3
WR	R Wayne	236	4	A Brown	225	4
Flex	E Decker	201	5	J Nelson	205	5
TE	J Cook	170	10	M Bennett	166	12
K	G Hartley	131	Â	Alex Henry	121	15
DT	Steelers	116	Â	Browns	118	16
Â	TOTALS	1930	Â	Â	1838	Â
BN	M ingram	112	7	A Bradshaw	162	6
BN	R Wilson	330	8	Ben Tate	106	7
BN	A Boldin	156	9	Joique Bell	91	9
BN	B Brown (HC)	80	11	J Gordon	188	10
BN	B Hartline	147	12	C Palmer	265	11
BN	M Tolbert	64	13	C Michael	73	13
BN	O Daniels	160	14	R Broyles	144	14
Â	TOTALS	1049	Â	Â	1029	Â
WIN	STARTERS	92	Â	RESERVES	20	Â

Ray Flowers:  As perfect as Round 2 draft by The Oracle was, this was well…not so much.  Every way I look at this, I cannot find a way to fall in love with this.  Too many issues: (1) Ray took Lynch over Arian Foster; (2) Fitzgerald has to have major bounce season; (3) Bradshaw is always hurt and when healthy inconsistent; (4) bench is filled with backups and question marks.  Crazy, but the numbers are a lot better than I would have thought.  So how does this happen?  The competition was GREAT.  There were at least three other teams who had great drafts in this league.  That makes you have to reach.  It also makes it harder for one of these guys to win.Grade: C+The Machine:  Looking at the starting lineup and this team is stacked.  Stafford in the 6^th round after McCoy, S-Jax, V-Jax, Wayne and Decker is simply a steal.  Solid all the way around and love the TE duo of Cook and Daniels.  The big question mark is taking second QB so early with Russell Wilson in 8^th round.  We have rules and The Machine saw that as the best way to protect the position and to lower the win probability of at least one team.  Call it playing defense if you will.  The Machine also now understands Handcuffs and when you need to own them.  Hate the Tolbert pick, but they cannot all be perfect.Grade: A-

Lessons Learned 

So what did we learn? We learned that Ray Flowers is a good drafter and a good guy to take on something like this.  We learned that it isn’t all about the numbers.  We learned that injuries and handcuffing are now included in The Machine’s features.  We learned that a machine run by a human can compete with someone who is great in just about any challenge.The most important thing is to understand that in life like in fantasy football, we use machines to help us. We take as much information as we can in, but we make decisions of our own because it is simply more fun that way. Winning is fun don't get me wrong, but more fun when you make good decisions. You will make BETTER SMARTER decisions with The Machine.

So like when Ray took Lynch instead of Arian Foster in the first round of draft #3, The Machine would have used iRobot's words: “You are making a mistake. My logic is undeniable.”

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Rick Wolf, Co-Host of Colton & The Wolfman - Sirius XM Fantasy Sports Radio Rick Wolf is a leader in the fantasy sports industry. Wolf is a founding Board Member and one of only fifteen FSTA Hall of Famers including Bill James and Matthew Berry. Wolf’s career accomplishments include starting the fantasy sports division at SportsLine USA that became CBS SportsLine, incubating Rotoworld to become the #1 fantasy sports news site, and spearheading the sale of Allstar Stats/Rotoworld to NBC Sports in 2006.  With college friend and fellow Hall of Famer, Glenn Colton, the team has won 7 expert titles in baseball and football.