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:
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 8th round. Backups are good with upside. Donât love the Handcuff of Forte with Michael Bush. Like a movie without sex or violenceâ¦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 3rd year, so huge upside.Grade: A-
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 âperfectâ. 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. Donât love this, but it is playable.Grade: B
Ray Flowers: As perfect as Round 2 draft by The Oracle was, this was wellâ¦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 6th 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 8th 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-
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. Wolfâs 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.
- A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
- A robot must obey the orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
- 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:- The settings would be set the same for all three drafts.
- The earliest round for a position would be set based on most likely round they are picked in drafts this season.
- Josh Rabbitt had to take The Machineâs advice for the first or second player it suggested.
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:Â 10pm ET on Monday August 26thÂ
- Draft 2:Â 10pm ET on Thursday August 29thÂ
- Draft 3:Â 1pm ET on Tues September 3rdÂ
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 |
 | TOTALS | 1986 |  |  | 1870 |  |
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 |
 | TOTALS | 1194 |  |  | 1055 |  |
WIN | STARTERS | 116 | Â | RESERVES | 139 | Â |
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 |
 | TOTALS | 1986 |  |  | 1905 |  |
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 |
 | TOTALS | 1087 |  |  | 1021 |  |
WIN | STARTERS | 81 | Â | RESERVES | 66 | Â |
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 |
 | TOTALS | 1930 |  |  | 1838 |  |
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 |
 | TOTALS | 1049 |  |  | 1029 |  |
WIN | STARTERS | 92 | Â | RESERVES | 20 | Â |
Lessons LearnedÂ
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 isnât all about the numbers. We learned that injuries and handcuffing are now included in The Machineâs 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: âYou are making a mistake. My logic is undeniable.â
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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. Wolfâs 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.