Why is Steve Smith #1? Because someone has to be.
A few posts down, my colleague Jason Wood asks why Steve Smith is the consensus #1 fantasy wide receiver. In that post, Jason makes a strong case that Smith isn’t a very impressive number one. The problem is, if you drop Smith down, someone has to move into that #1 slot. And, whoever that is, it’ll be just as easy to write a blog post wondering why that guy is number one. No, it’ll be easier, which is why Steve Smith finds himself at the top of the list.
Many of us started our fantasy football careers in the era of Jerry Rice, so there was never a question as to who the number one WR was. When Rice ceased to be dominant, there was a brief period of chaos, but then Randy Moss quickly stepped into the role of clear number one, where Marvin Harrison and Terrell Owens soon joined him to form the “Big Three” that reigned for the first half of this decade.
The point is: most of us have never known a time when there wasn’t at least one sure thing at WR, a guy who you knew was going to distance himself from the pack, and who you could feel comfortable taking at the end of the first round.
So the situation we find ourselves in now is strange. Steve Smith sure doesn’t feel like a guy who should be ranked number one. But neither do Torry Holt (who is now 31 and has never been regarded as the top fantasy WR), Terrell Owens (who will turn 34 this year), Chad Johnson (who was horribly inconsistent last year and hasn’t even outproduced his own teammate lately on a points-per-game basis), or anyone else.
It’s as though slots one through three are vacant, and Smith is #4. Meanwhile, we’re just waiting for someone — Lee Evans? Andre Johnson? Larry Fitzgerald? Reggie Wayne? Calvin Johnson? Maybe even Steve Smith — to start a 5-year run of 1500+ yard / 12 TD seasons.
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