Thankfully for everyone involved, this list of my favorite things does not involve whiskers on kittens. These are my go-to resources, the guys I trust the most, and people/organizations to whom I will be posting links on an ongoing basis. We all have our stand-by's - here are mine:
RotoWorld
If there is one site I can't live without, it's RotoWorld. But not for their amazing articles or expert advice - their contributors are solid but unspectacular and it drives me nuts that their rankings are behind a pay wall. But the constant stream of fantasy-slanted player news makes this site worth checking about a dozen times a day (seriously).
ESPN Fantasy Football
As much as we sports fans hear about the "Four Letter Network", their sheer size and amount of resources makes them a viable place for fantasy information. They post projections every week - frankly, I never look at them and wouldn't recommend it. They do, however, strive at posting interesting articles, especially in their "Draft Kit". The "32 Q's" series has a couple clunkers, but for the most part, they are interesting and relevant reads.
The Fantasy Focus Football podcast is a good listen if you have a long drive or some downtime during the day. It has its fair share of shtick, but it's relatively entertaining to the typical degenerate and has some good information.
Of the ESPN writers, Christopher Harris takes the cake for me. Nate Ravitz, Eric Karabell, Matthew Berry, et al are good enough writers, but I tend to agree with the rationale used by Harris more often than any other ESPN contributor. ESPN also employs a stable of writers who are part fantasy, part general football, like KC Joyner. Joyner in particular holds a high level of esteem within in the industry... but I still don't know why. He may be a bright football mind, but his recommendations for fantasy are typically far from accurate.
Pro Football Talk
Mike Florio and Gregg Rosenthal do an excellent job of keeping football fans posted on news, right as it happens, and they're nearly 100% accurate with their reports (I fell for PFT when they helped me win an office pool on which team would draft Tim Tebow last year). There isn't an fantasy spin on their posts (though there's a link to RotoWorld on the site), but we all know general information is invaluable to the fantasy football degenerate.
Football Outsiders
I consider myself a stat/math geek and even I don't understand all the calculations and permutations involved with FBO's metrics. But I can tell you that they are excellent football minds and they seem to be even more passionate than all the other competitors they face on the web. Every opinion is based on legitimate evidence, not just "hunches" and the site has the perfect combination of fantasy and non-fantasy focus. Beyond projections and fantasy spin, FBO has metrics for special teams, defenses, and even the likelihood of a team's injuries increasing. If you can understand just the basics of how they come up with the numbers, you'll have more than enough reason to visit the Outsiders a few times a week.
Dishonorable Mention
CBS Fantasy Football's Leagues - The articles on the site (particularly Jamie Eisenberg) are always decent quality, but the site is absolutely useless for managing a team/league. The site is nearly impossible to navigate, even down to something as simple as changing your team name. There's no watch list and even when you try to add a player, the only simple way to sort them is alphabetical. Sorry CBS, but I don't want to add Erik Ainge at QB... but thanks.
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