Focus: Josh Scobee
A weekly expository look at players who have momentum

Each week, Daniel Gilford reviews a player who has performed well recently. Daniel analyzes the player’s past performances, evaluates his present value, and projects his future significance as a fantasy football player. This week’s article focuses on a kicker. Yes, a kicker. With the emergence of an incredible player in Neil Rackers, (who incidentally has more points in standard Yahoo! leagues than Peyton Manning), kickers have risen to greater heights in the fantasy football arena. Josh Scobee has also been making an impact on his team, and this week we focus on the placekicker for the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Past

Josh played his first high school football game at Longview (Texas) High. Along with being a place kicker, Scobee also handled the punting duties. In his senior year in high school, he nailed all 23 of his extra point attempts, and was six for nine in the field goal category.

Despite his slow start in kicking field goals in high school, Scobee became an excellent player for Louisiana Tech. He won the starting role there as a true freshman, and displayed incredible talent at both long kick attempts and kickoffs. In college he broke Matt Stover’s record number of field goals with 66, and scored 343 total points. In the WAC (Western Athletic Conference) this career scoring number was only topped by Jason Elam, Marshall Faulk, and Derek Mahoney.

In 2004 the Jaguars selected Josh Scobee with their fifth-round selection in the NFL draft.

In his rookie season, Scobee struggled. He completed only 24 of 31 field goals, but was able to knock down 21 extra points. He converted only 66% of all his field goal attempts over 29 yards, but managed to start all 16 games in Jacksonville. The Jaguars were not about to give up on Scobee that early.

Performance

In 2005 it became clear that Scobee had improved. In the very first game of the season (vs. Seattle) Scobee made four of his five field goal attempts and put two more extra points through the uprights. Scoring a total of 14 points, Josh showed his team that he has what it takes.

Since the first week Scobee has added six more field goals to his chart and five more extra points.

Last week vs. the Bengals, Josh showed brilliance, kicking three field goals and two more extra points. He kicked two completions over 50 yards, becoming the first placekicker in Jacksonville to ever accomplish the feat, and his longest completion last week was a whopping 53 yards. Also, Scobee has never missed a single extra point in his career in the league.

In addition, Scobee’s great play last week led his team to a win over the Bengals, and he was named the AFC Special Teams Player of the Week for his long field goal conversions. What’s so incredible about this? He’s earned the award three times in his last 16 games.

Potential

As you examine Scobee’s stats, they look very good at first. But when you’re analyzing statistics for fantasy football, you always have to peel an extra layer off. You have to look for consistency…

If you disregard his first game against Seattle and his last game vs. Cincinnati, Scobee has only converted three of four field goals in the 2005 season. He has also kicked just three extra points in those games.

Scobee can flat out kick. I don’t think anyone will argue about that, but for fantasy football he is not going to be a consistent player. This makes it all the more important that you pay attention to the following fact:

Scobee has only done well when he’s playing a team with an average or worse defense.

Read that through again; make sure you understand that if you start Scobee on a week he’s playing a good defense (for example, his matchup this week against the Steelers) you should not expect good production out of him.

When you are playing any player like Scobee who is inconsistent, you have to pay attention to the matchup.

As I said, Scobee is not a good start this week vs. the Steelers, but in the weeks to follow I think he is a very good play. Thankfully, for the rest of the season the Jaguars’ schedule is relatively easy. Any week that he is playing a team that gives up a substantial amount of yards to offenses (especially rushing yards), you want to start Scobee.

If you are struggling in your league and Scobee is a free agent or on your waiver wire, pick him up. Make the roster room and grab him. But do not drop a kicker to add him to your squad if you have only one kicker on your team. You have to have a “kicker-by-committee” where you start Scobee in his good matchup weeks and start someone else on the weeks he is facing a tough defense.

But if you are desperate and you need some help, take a chance on Scobee. At the beginning of this week he was only owned in about 38% of all leagues, but while we near the end of this week, he is owned 56% of leagues. If he is available in your league, grab him while he’s still there.

Prediction: Josh Scobee will finish the year converting 29-of-40 field goal attempts and kicking 20 extra points.

Matchup Planner – Start or Bench: Week 6 at Pittsburgh – Bench Week 7 – Bye Week Week 8 at St. Louis – Start Week 9 vs. Houston – Start Week 10 vs. Baltimore – Bench Week 11 at Tennessee – Start Week 12 at Arizona – Start Week 13 at Cleveland – Start Week 14 vs. Indianapolis – Bench Week 15 vs. San Francisco – Start Week 16 at Houston – Start Week 17 vs. Tennessee – Start

(Underlining indicates the best and worst Starts & Benches)

 
Daniel Gilford is a hard working Communications major at St. Petersburg College. Recently, Daniel became a member of the Cafe’s response team, and when he is neglecting his college work, you’ll find him posting under the name danleroi22 in the forums. Daniel also enjoys taking an active role in the Cafe’s contests and games (although he’s not very good at them).

Questions or comments for Daniel? Post your thoughts in the Cafe’s forums!