jerome_harrisonAn industry-wide report evaluating preseason fantasy football players rankings of 48 fantasy web sites announced that CBSSports.com was most accurate. The results are consistent with TBL’s own fantasy football rankings report, which came out a couple weeks ago and also determined that CBSSports.com’s rankings achieved a relatively high level of accuracy.

The top five was rounded out by KFFL, ProFootballWeekly.com, Draft Analyzer Ultimate, and Sports Illustrated.

Sidney-RiceThe report was compiled by Sara Holladay (aka Fantasy Football Librarian) in partnership with the Fantasy Sports Trade Association, which announced the results this week at its annual conference. Results can be viewed on the NYTimes.com’s Fifth Down  Blog.

Some highlights from CBSSports.com’s preseason lists: projecting LaDainian Tomlinson as a relative bust; Dallas Clark as the top fantasy tight end; and Steve Smith (NYG) as a potential sleeper.

It’s the third year that Holladay has done these accuracy ratings (Here’s 2007 and 2008 ). Comparing results year-to-year, the first thing that jumps out is, well, nothing. CBSSports.com doesn’t appear in the top ten last year and was sixth in 2007. The 2007 and 2008 winners, Fantazzle Fantasy Sports and Ask The Commish, respectively, weren’t on this year’s top-15. In all, there isn’t any site that appears in the top ratings for all three years.

The conclusion is in line with what I’ve long suspected about projecting sports-related outcomes: They’re a crapshoot and even the most talented experts can’t consistently get it right. This is nothing earth shattering, of course. A whole book was written about that concept.

Holladay indicates as much in the post. She says that this year’s average preseason draft position finished well for the second season in a row. She writes: “The ‘wisdom of the crowd’ is a fairly accurate barometer.”