2013 NFL Free Agents: Top 50 List

Ethen thanks for the comment. Some real good points here.

We don’t factor in the addition cost for restricted free agents, which is something that we probably should adjust for. I’m glad you pointed that out.

Jarius Byrd is awesome! He’s certainly in the discussion for being the No. 1 overall player, but given how dominate Ryan Clady has been and the fact that he’s only 26, makes it really hard to overlook him for the top spot, at least from my perspective.

Melton played over 600 snaps and graded out as No. 16 overall player in 2011 and this season he improved upon his performance. It’s hard to find a guy who’s only 26 and provides an incredible ability to rush the quarterback from the interior defensive line. His market value right now is through the roof.

Your point about Steven Jackson is well taken. I feel like he should be a little higher considering that he’s still an impact player, but our system hates aging running backs, so it took some additional adjustments to get him this high. I’ll consider moving him up a bit in the coming weeks.

Jacob, this is a very good question that should help to shed some light on our methodology for this list.

Our Top 50 list takes into account a number of variables such age, position value and overall performance. Andre Smith got off to a terrible start with the Bengals, but has really turned things around in a dramatic way the last two years. Because there isn’t much to work with in terms of stats for offensive lineman as well as other positions, we decided to factor in Pro Football Focus’ ratings for each free agent.

Here’s a look at the players that you’ve mentioned and how they breakdown based on these ratings:

Andre Smith: #28 (2011), #4 (2012)
Jake Long: #21 (2011), #46 (2012)
Branden Albert: #18 (2011), #26 (2012)
Phil Loadholt: #24 (2011), #22 (2012)

You’ll see that you’re correct in that Smith wasn’t better than any of the players that you mentioned in 2011, but showed dramatic improvement this season. I should also note that our rating system weights 2012 production slightly higher 2011 simply because recent performance always has an impact on a free agent’s market value.

Smith is also helped by the fact that he’s just 26 years old and has two years on both Long and Albert. Long has been dealing with injuries and hasn’t been the same player that he was in his first few season in the league. The Dolphins reportedly would consider re-signing him but only at a reasonable price.

Our list changes as free agency draws closer, so we’ll take your points into consideration for our next update that will hopefully include more players after teams start addressing their rosters.

Thanks for pointing out that Talib’s team hadn’t been updated.

This list actually takes into account a number of variables when determining the rankings. We factor in ability, age, position value and their Pro Football Focus rating for the last two years.

Wes Welker is an amazing WR, but NFL teams don’t pay players based solely on what they’ve done in the past. If that were the case, Welker would already have his long-term contract in place with the Patriots, but they’ve shown no signs of wanting to commit that kind of cash to him.

Flacco is the only starting QB available on the market, as of now, so his position value really comes into play here. Teams are prone towards overpaying average quarterbacks and Flacco would find plenty of interest on the open market. You could easily argue that other players are better in terms of talent, but this list accounts for more variables than just that, which brings me to Tony Gonzalez.

Of course Gonzalez is better than some of the players ahead of him, but the fact that he’ll be 37 next year factors in greatly. Would you rather have a single season of Tony Gonzalez or the next 6 or 7 years from some like Mike Wallace?

Ranking players will always require a certain amount of subjectivity, so we try our best to account for a number of variables to limit the impact of our personal opinions as best as we can.

Thanks for the comment Doug.