Projection Pal Now Available

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Projection Pal is now up, available for download from the same page everyone downloaded the Compiler and Draft Buddy from. It is a separate download file.

 

Keep in mind that Projection Pal is a completely optional add-on for the Compiler. While a lot of people like it and use it, if you are happy using the projections already included in the Compiler - which are mighty fine projections - then you do not need Pal.

 

The latest tutorial I have for Pal is actually from the 2010 baseball version, but they work exactly the same. I'll try to work up a football tutorial video, but in the meantime you may find this useful for some guidance:

 

[Rotogar 0]

I've used (and loved) Projection Pal in the past. But I'm having a spot of trouble. I'm trying to bring ESPN projections into the Compiler using Projection Pal. They list the player name like this: "Drew Brees, NO QB" or "Aaron Rodgers, GB QB". When I select 'FirstName LastName' to process the name, I get nothing but #N/A in the Clean data tab and nothing at all in the Compiler. Do I need to manually strip the ", TEAM POS" from the end of each player or is there an automatic way to do this?

[FlaHawker 24]

I've used (and loved) Projection Pal in the past. But I'm having a spot of trouble. I'm trying to bring ESPN projections into the Compiler using Projection Pal. They list the player name like this: "Drew Brees, NO QB" or "Aaron Rodgers, GB QB". When I select 'FirstName LastName' to process the name, I get nothing but #N/A in the Clean data tab and nothing at all in the Compiler. Do I need to manually strip the ", TEAM POS" from the end of each player or is there an automatic way to do this?

Hi Rotogar,

 

I had the same problem with ESPN. There might be an easier way of doing but I manually stripped that information. Maybe Mike has an easier way of doing it.

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Hi Rotogar,

 

I had the same problem with ESPN. There might be an easier way of doing but I manually stripped that information. Maybe Mike has an easier way of doing it.

 

Hey guys. I think I can come up with a formula to tackle that. It will basically need to find the comma, and just keep everything to the left of it.

 

I am away from home right now though and having a heck of a time with a really crappy Internet connection (yes, I'm in "the sticks" - against my will). I can barely read the forums much less respond. I'll figure out the formula plus where to put it and respond back as soon as I can.

 

FH - In response to your other post (all I could see is the title), do some digging at fflibrarian.com for past projection accuracy results. I'd have to go back and look at the 2009 projections to remember for sure what players stood out from the norm, and assess whether they exceeded, met or fell flat from expectations.

[FlaHawker 24]

Hey guys. I think I can come up with a formula to tackle that. It will basically need to find the comma, and just keep everything to the left of it.

 

I am away from home right now though and having a heck of a time with a really crappy Internet connection (yes, I'm in "the sticks" - against my will). I can barely read the forums much less respond. I'll figure out the formula plus where to put it and respond back as soon as I can.

 

FH - In response to your other post (all I could see is the title), do some digging at fflibrarian.com for past projection accuracy results. I'd have to go back and look at the 2009 projections to remember for sure what players stood out from the norm, and assess whether they exceeded, met or fell flat from expectations.

Thanks! Will do!

[Rotogar 0]

Thanks! I look forward to the update. Great job. As usual!

[Mike MacGregor 20]

I've used (and loved) Projection Pal in the past. But I'm having a spot of trouble. I'm trying to bring ESPN projections into the Compiler using Projection Pal. They list the player name like this: "Drew Brees, NO QB" or "Aaron Rodgers, GB QB". When I select 'FirstName LastName' to process the name, I get nothing but #N/A in the Clean data tab and nothing at all in the Compiler. Do I need to manually strip the ", TEAM POS" from the end of each player or is there an automatic way to do this?

 

Hooray, I'm back at home and can get back to what I love doing. I mean, vacationing with family is okay and all, but it is no helping run a fantasy football website. But what is really?

 

I believe I have a solution for this. Here are the steps:

 

1. When you copy in your projections we are going to need an empty column to the left of the projection numbers, so make sure when you copy it inside the grey sections just copy it a bit to the right from where you otherwise would put it.

 

2. Okay, assuming your data looks something like this inside the grey:

 

B ..... C ............... D ... E ....

[blank] Drew Brees, NO QB PaAtt PaComp

 

etc., etc.,

 

what we are going to do is put a formula in that blank column that finds the comma in the name and extracts everything except the comma and "NO QB". Then the new column will be your "First Name Last Name" header. You'll mark the other one as "Other".

 

Here is the formula:

 

=LEFT(C1,FIND(",",C1)-1)

 

C1 is the Excel reference to the cell with "Drew Brees, NO QB".

 

3. Copy that formula all the way down for all names. Once it appears to be working, highlight the whole range with the formulas, copy it (CTRL-C) and then in the exact same spot select Edit > Paste Special > As Values. This removes the formulas but essentially locks in place the names in First Name Last Name format.

 

4. As mentioned above, change your headings for each column. The original name column is now "Other".

 

5. Now hit Copy to Compiler.

 

Make sense?

[FlaHawker 24]

Hooray, I'm back at home and can get back to what I love doing. I mean, vacationing with family is okay and all, but it is no helping run a fantasy football website. But what is really?

 

I believe I have a solution for this. Here are the steps:

 

1. When you copy in your projections we are going to need an empty column to the left of the projection numbers, so make sure when you copy it inside the grey sections just copy it a bit to the right from where you otherwise would put it.

 

2. Okay, assuming your data looks something like this inside the grey:

 

B ..... C ............... D ... E ....

[blank] Drew Brees, NO QB PaAtt PaComp

 

etc., etc.,

 

what we are going to do is put a formula in that blank column that finds the comma in the name and extracts everything except the comma and "NO QB". Then the new column will be your "First Name Last Name" header. You'll mark the other one as "Other".

 

Here is the formula:

 

=LEFT(C1,FIND(",",C1)-1)

 

C1 is the Excel reference to the cell with "Drew Brees, NO QB".

 

3. Copy that formula all the way down for all names. Once it appears to be working, highlight the whole range with the formulas, copy it (CTRL-C) and then in the exact same spot select Edit > Paste Special > As Values. This removes the formulas but essentially locks in place the names in First Name Last Name format.

 

4. As mentioned above, change your headings for each column. The original name column is now "Other".

 

5. Now hit Copy to Compiler.

 

Make sense?

Sounds good to me. Let me give it a try and I'll get back in a minute.

[chuckiep 0]

Mike,

 

Any reason why on projection pal the WR's lost the ability to have RuYd and RuTd? I know it's not a big deal, but guys like DeSean Jackson will lose value overall because they're not being calculated in...I guess another way to skin the cat would be to add their rush yards to their rec yards (as long as their scored the same) to get a hybrid number...

 

Any other thoughts?

 

Thanks.

 

CP

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Mike,

 

Any reason why on projection pal the WR's lost the ability to have RuYd and RuTd? I know it's not a big deal, but guys like DeSean Jackson will lose value overall because they're not being calculated in...I guess another way to skin the cat would be to add their rush yards to their rec yards (as long as their scored the same) to get a hybrid number...

 

Any other thoughts?

 

Thanks.

 

CP

 

You could put projected rushing yards and rushing TD for WR in the custom fields in the Compiler, to show them and score them separately. Your idea of combining them in quite good too. We don't project rushing stats for WR or TE, which is why those fields are not in the Compiler (and therefore not applicable in Projection Pal).

[team_graffix 0]

the projection pal is averaging the three sites I input, however if it is blank, it is taking the overall ranking down. This is changing my IDP rankings since I cannot find good projections.

 

How do I tell compiler to ignore the blank cells and average only cells that are populated?

 

Thanks,

Andrew

[Mike MacGregor 20]

the projection pal is averaging the three sites I input, however if it is blank, it is taking the overall ranking down. This is changing my IDP rankings since I cannot find good projections.

 

How do I tell compiler to ignore the blank cells and average only cells that are populated?

 

Thanks,

Andrew

 

Hi Andrew. If you go to the individual position tabs, you can change the allocation key by player. So, if a player has projections from all three sites (FF Today + 2 others) then just keep it as the default key whatever that is. Lets say 34%/33%/33%.

 

If a player has projections from only 2 sites, FF Today plus Site B, then change the allocation key for that player to something different. Something that only uses a weighted average between the projection sites you have, 50%/50%/0%.

 

Do the same for other players. You might have to create more allocation keys on the setup tab.

 

To see where to put the allocation key, go to the DL tab and click the first "+" sign across the top of the tab. That will open up some columns for you. You want the yellow section with heading "Non-Default % Key".

[team_graffix 0]

Thanks - it worked. Projections are back in line and ready to draft

[klaatu 2]

Mike, I've got a similar issue -- I want to import some projections for which the players are in the LastName, FirstName format (e.g., Johnson, Chris). Is there a formula that could be substituted for the one you describe above that would do this conversion?

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Hi klaatu. If the name is strictly LastName, First Name (with space after the comma), then I believe that is one of the options in Pal that will convert it for you automatically.

 

If there is no space, which I noticed with one website, highlight all of the player names, hit CTRL-H to bring up the Find/Replace box. In the Find box put a comma "," and in the Replace box put a comma-space ", ". Replace all, and then use the same LastName, FirstName option for the player name from Pal.

 

The formula above was necessary because the same cell with the player name also had the position and team abbreviation in it.

[klaatu 2]

Whoops, my bad -- I see now where Lastname, Firstname is selected. That will cover my needs -- thanks, Mike.

[jwohlberg 0]

Great site. Fantastic information, as always. I'm having an issue w/ Projection Pal, can you help? It doesn't seem to be converting "Chris Johnson" (from CBS stats) to "Chris Johnson (RB)" to pull in his data for RB Clean. Same issue w/ Adrian Peterson vs Adrian Peterson (MIN), and a custom one I set up to convert Beanie Wells to Chris Wells. Am I missing a step?

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Hard to say, but the easy way to avoid this is simply edit the names yourself on the RB Raw tab. Just click on each name and change them so they match the Compiler. Then hit Copy to Compiler, again.

[R. Flan 0]

You could put projected rushing yards and rushing TD for WR in the custom fields in the Compiler, to show them and score them separately. Your idea of combining them in quite good too. We don't project rushing stats for WR or TE, which is why those fields are not in the Compiler (and therefore not applicable in Projection Pal).

 

I understand putting those stats in the custom field, but how do you get the cheatsheets to pick up the additional points created by these fields?

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Hi R.F. You need to adjust the scoring for the custom fields on the scoring tab for the relevant positions. Then after that change you need to hit Compile Cheatsheets again so the change is reflected in the cheatsheets.

[R. Flan 0]

Hi R.F. You need to adjust the scoring for the custom fields on the scoring tab for the relevant positions. Then after that change you need to hit Compile Cheatsheets again so the change is reflected in the cheatsheets.

 

I do this in the compiler? I see the scoring tab, but I'm still not sure how to make it find the stats I have in the custom fields.

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Ha. I have a feeling what is wrong here. Are you not seeing the custom field scoring options on your scoring tab in the Compiler?

 

[R. Flan 0]

Ha. I have a feeling what is wrong here. Are you not seeing the custom field scoring options on your scoring tab in the Compiler?

 

 

Correct, I don't have these custom field boxes in my compiler. What do I need to do to get them?

[Mike MacGregor 20]

Send me your copy of the Compiler and I'll put them in, compiler@fftoday.com.

 

What has happened is you've been copying league profiles from your prior year Compiler for some time, and as a result going back (a few years now) when we didn't have those options, it copied in that old version of the scoring tab, wiping out the custom field boxes.

 

That would explain the confusion. I'm saying, "Look right there. It's right there.", and you're thinking, "What the heck is he talking about?"