Here is the scoring system that I used to rank the players:

Top 10: The consensus top four backs remain that way here, albeit in a different order than most would expect. Jones-Drew and Chris Johnson have very similar situations in that both players have their team’s backfield all to themselves on offenses where running the ball is the focus. Where I separate the two backs this year is that while MJD’s supporting cast got a bit stronger (or more experienced), Johnson’s crew lost a bit up front (TE Alge Crumpler and C Kevin Mawae were allowed to leave). The other difference – and critics would say it is too small of one to consider – is the two opponents Tennessee and Jacksonville do not share. Whereas CJ has Pittsburgh and Miami to contend with, MJD has Buffalo and Cleveland.

The other eyebrow-raiser in this group figures to be Rice over Peterson. This order pretty much stems from my belief that Rice will not only benefit from a much easier schedule than the one Peterson has, but that he will also make Willis McGahee obsolete early in the season, much as Johnson did with LenDale White in 2009. Despite the large PPG difference between Steven Jackson and Michael Turner, I am very tempted to flip the two backs in my rankings. But in PPR – and even with my belief that Turner will be slightly more involved in the passing game – Jackson should probably win out as he not only figures to be right there with Turner in rushing yards, but he also produces like a low-end slot receiver in the passing game.

11-20: Much like I believe Rice will secure the majority of carries in Baltimore’s backfield, I feel Charles will do the same in KC. The major difference is that Thomas Jones is a much better back (in reality or fantasy) than McGahee. Still, I question Jones 4.2 YPC with the Jets’ good run-blocking line and marvel at Charles 5.9 YPC behind the Chiefs’ below-average line (which actually was over six YPC after he was named the starter in 2009). In my estimation, Charles will see 250 rushes and 50 catches while Jones will relieve him on the occasional series and at the goal line.

Peyton Manning gets a bump over Romo simply because of his consistency, but it is such a close call that if I were to draft 10 times and had to choose between them, I may go with one of them five times and do the same with the other. Wayne finds himself at the tail end of this group for two reasons: 1) even though he is the lead WR with Manning at QB, there are just getting to be too many mouths to feed in Indy and 2) he’ll face off against Raiders CB Nnamdi Asomugha in Week 16. Assuming the Colts don’t have another home-field berth locked up by that point again (at which point he may get pulled at halftime), the idea of Wayne facing one of the top 2-3 CBs in the league probably won’t help fantasy owners win their titles.

21-50: After spending a great deal of time believing that Mendenhall and Mathews would get passed over when the offense moved inside the 10, I was convinced otherwise over the weekend – at least in one case anyway. Regarding Mendenhall, this article changed my mind regarding his red-zone opportunities. (Keep in mind, however, that OC Bruce Arians has compared Mendenhall to Edgerrin James since he was a rookie and still has yet to use him in that fashion.) As for Mathews, he was given a handful of carries inside the 10 during the first half of the Chargers’ preseason game vs. the Cowboys. Ultimately, Rivers scored on a QB sneak when Mathews was unable to cross the stripe, but the implied message is that Mike Tolbert and Mathews are definitely still competing for those all-important short-yardage carries. In Pittsburgh, the competition for Mendenhall is Isaac “Red Zone” Redman, who has quickly emerged as Mendenhall’s most likely “handcuff”. If for some reason either Mendenhall or Mathews comes up short in the red zone over the first 2-3 weeks of the regular season, don’t be a bit surprised if Tolbert or Redman take the job and keep it for the rest of the season. If I was to institute a red-zone meter that measured a feature back’s grasp on his team’s goal-line carries, I would put Mendenhall at about a 7 while Mathews would score a 5.

Unless he continues to have problems with his hamstring (which the Broncos are treating with extreme care), Moreno is on track for Week 1 and figures to be the centerpiece of the Denver offense. Although I am a big fan of his, he should be not considered a RB1 in 12-team leagues due to his obvious downside (bad offense, Brandon Marshall no longer around to draw a double team, etc). But due to the lack of feature RBs in great situations, he will likely be many owners’ top RB. The same thing goes for Greene, who is in a great situation, but will need to come close to Michael Turner’s 2008 season if he hopes to produce like a RB1 in fantasy because he will give his owners virtually nothing as a receiver.

It pains me to group Fitzgerald in with the misfits (Marshall) and injury risks (Smith, Boldin), but the offense is going to be more balanced and the Cardinals’ WR probably isn’t going to be more productive with less opportunity and a less accurate QB. Of the backs in the top end of this group, I really like Benson and Foster to play like RB1s in fantasy. In fact, Benson would be higher on the list if I could convince myself he is anything more than an average back that was capable of scoring 10+ TDs in what should be a dynamic offense. As for Foster, the Texans seem to be falling in love with him. If he gets the workload I expect him to get, he may be a top 10 fantasy RB this season.

Best was considerably higher on my board earlier this month, but I’m backing off just a bit to protect myself against his injury history. Still, I have him ranked as a mid-range RB2 in 12-team leagues at the end of the third round, so it is not as if I have soured on him all that much. And for yet another shocker…Finley is my #1 PPR TE. It wouldn’t surprise me if a Vincent Jackson-less Chargers’ offense made Gates an 80-catch TE for the third time in his career, but the offseason Finley has enjoyed has catapulted him (in my opinion anyway) from the back end of the elite TEs to the top of the position. And because he is Aaron Rodgers’ preferred weapon in the red zone AND he will be seeing time in the slot, it is quite possible he lives up to my lofty expectations.

51-100: One of the offseason’s top fantasy stories, Kolb makes his “Big Board” debut at #51. As I stated in my Updated Projections piece, I see a bit of Aaron Rodgers in him. The difference between 2010 Kolb and 2008 Rodgers, however, is that Michael Vick will get thrown into the mix every so often and I fear that will keep the former from being an elite option in fantasy this season. The other part that scares me a bit about Kolb is the schedule; he does not face a single defense over the second half of the season in which we can safely say he will dominate the matchup. I’ll quickly move down just two spots to talk up Michael Bush, who I expect will command about 70% of the workload in Oakland this season. With Jason Campbell, Zach Miller and Louis Murphy making the passing game at least somewhat respectable, the time is now for Bush. Keep in mind this is a RB who averaged 4.8 YPC last season for an offense that struck no fear in opponents through the air.

At this point, I’m going to skip down to the trio of WRs I have at 59-61. Mike Sims-Walker should be a rock-solid option when he plays, which may be five or 15 games considering his injury history. There’s no doubt a healthy Terrell Owens will help the Bengals, but will it help Ochocinco revert back to the inconsistent fantasy force he was a few years ago or the more consistent fantasy wideout he has become? Sidney Rice has become a huge question mark and I’m not exactly sure I want to be counting on him (or Percy Harvin, for that matter) as anything more than WR3s in fantasy this season.

After watching both of their games during this preseason and studying the stats from last season, the Bills’ awful offensive line only appears to be awful when they decide to pass. The run blocking is at least good enough to support two useful fantasy backs that complement each other well and I think that is exactly what will happen with Fred Jackson and Spiller. I don’t believe either back will visit the end zone all that much, but I could easily see a scenario in which Jackson rushes for a 1,000 yards and Spiller leads the team in catches. Because Jackson will still catch a few balls and Spiller will take 8-10 handoffs per game, their end-of-the-year totals should make each player a worthy RB3.

I have really started to come around on Knox. While others chase the hype of Hester or the late-season production of Aromashodu, I’ve seen what I needed to see from the WR who will line up in Torry Holt’s old split end position in Mike Martz’s offense. The fact that he wrapped up a starting job – and a specific role at that – in June while Hester and Aromashodu are still fighting over the flanker spot suggest that Knox has done the best job at transitioning into the new offense and is probably the best route runner. Combining the mental discipline with his elite track speed, Knox is going to be a handful for defensive backs under Martz and would be my prediction as a mid-round WR who enjoys the same kind of breakout season DeSean Jackson had in 2010.

I absolutely hate putting Welker at #85 overall (#27 amongst WRs), but I will have my doubts about his knee all season long. Keep in mind that he not only blew out his ACL in Week 17 of last season, but also he waited a month for his MCL to heal on its own before undergoing the ACL surgery. If the injury would have occurred in Week 1 of the 2009 season, that would be one thing. But we are looking at having Welker back just over six months after surgery in what is usually an 18-month recovery period (in terms of regaining pre-surgery speed and quickness), so either Welker will have healed at three times the speed most athletes do or he will be a shell of himself this year. Based on my ranking, I think it’s obvious which way I am leaning.

I am finally ready to drop Vincent Jackson. If he stays in San Diego and ends up changing his mind about playing this year, he’ll miss six games for sure now. If he is traded, he’ll have to learn a new system on the fly and probably be used strictly as a deep threat until that team has a bye week. Of course, he still will miss the first three weeks of the season regardless due to his suspension.

101-150: I dropped Harvin significantly following his latest migrane-related incident. If he can play 15 games like he did last season, I feel he is a solid bet to be the Vikings’ top receiver. But his health issues are becoming enough of a concern that he must be considered a weekly “injury risk” and owners will need to treat him much as we used to treat Brian Westbrook – hope that he stays off the injury report and doesn’t hit you with a surprise DNP. As a result, I have lumped him in with two other very talented receivers who already know they will be missing time in 2010 – Santonio Holmes and Vincent Jackson. In fact, all the players from 101-106 fall into the injury risk or suspended category.

I’m not quite as high on Edelman as I was about a month ago, but I’m holding firm to my belief about Welker. And if/when Welker cannot play, owners will want the former Kent State QB on their roster. I have him rated as the first WR4 in 12-team leagues and would not be surprised if he performed like a top-end WR3 even if Welker and Moss both stay healthy.

Most observers will be shocked to see such a low ranking on Garcon, but I’m not really sure how he posts numbers much better than he did in 2009. Most defenses know Manning can/will burn them deep if they give him a chance, so they usually opt to give him the shorter routes. While Garcon is not strictly a deep threat, he rates well behind Wayne and Clark in the pecking order. And this year, he will have to cede at least some of his catches to Anthony Gonzalez.

11-20: While many fantasy owners are jumping off the Charles bandwagon, I don’t mind staying on. Yes, Thomas Jones is definitely a legitimate threat, but this whole scenario playing out in the preseason in Chiefs’ camp feels exactly like the same kind of motivational ploy HC Todd Haley tried to use with Dwayne Bowe in 2009.

For the very reasons I described in the PPR section, I cannot trust that Mendenhall and Mathews will be able to hold on to the goal-line duties all season long. For that reason, I feel very comfortable placing Manning and the four WRs I have from #15-18 overall ahead of them.

21-50: As one might expect, Stewart gets a nice boost up the board – six spots at the RB position and nine spots overall. On the other hand, McCoy falls completely out of the top 50, dropping 13 spots overall. Much as they have during the Andy Reid era recently, the Eagles’ offense doesn’t appear all that interested in running the ball or setting a tone on the ground. And seeing the way that McCoy is still struggling with blitz pickup in the preseason, he may lose regular work to Mike Bell and/or Leonard Weaver.

McCoy’s drop, however, pales in comparison to that of the Giants’ Steve Smith, who goes from #40 in PPR to #62 in non-PPR. Smith will continue to be a PPR stud because he and Eli Manning always appear to be in synch and he is his quarterback's most trusted option. But Nicks’ talent may be too much to ignore in non-PPR when fantasy owners subtract the 80+ catches Smith figures to get.

51-100: It’s an interesting thought that Ochocinco and Owens may finish with nearly identical stats, but it may be time to consider that T.O. will actually outperform his younger friend this season. Admittedly, I have Ochocinco as the higher-rated WR in PPR, but in non-PPR, Owens strikes me as the better bet given his long history of scoring touchdowns. Add in the fact that he is supposed to be the Bengals’ “deep threat” as well and it isn’t all that foolish to believe Owens is the more attractive fantasy WR. For all of his greatness, Ochocinco has yet to take that next step in terms of being a consistent red-zone force each and every week.

Fred Jackson is in a terrible situation. His team will be dreadful, his offensive line is about two years away from meeting NFL standards, he may miss Week 1 and he has to share carries with Spiller, to a certain extent. With that said, he’s being unfairly punished in drafts this summer. (For example, I landed him in the eighth round of a 14-team experts’ non-PPR draft completed on August 23.) While he won’t have the benefit of enjoying the majority of carries like he did for most of last year, let us remember that he enjoyed a pretty good rushing season in 2009 with virtually the same supporting cast.

101-150: I’ll be the first to admit that if McGahee continues to steal red-zone carries from Ray Rice, I’ll be considerably off on two projections. There is also a small chance McGahee gets traded at some point, which would leave Le’Ron McClain as the goal-line vulture. However, I don’t see either scenario stopping Rice from becoming a true fantasy animal, although it should be noted that Ravens OC Cam Cameron has a history of splitting the work in his backfield over the first 3-4 weeks of the season before settling on one bell-cow RB. Therefore, I have a hard time seeing McGahee being anywhere close to fantasy relevant as he was last season.

It’s no secret non-PPR leagues depress the value of some receivers. Two of the players the league change hurts the most are Houshmandzadeh and Welker. It wouldn’t be the least bit surprising if both players caught 80+ balls this season, but both are poor bets (in my mind anyway) to reach 1,000 yards receiving or catch more than four TD passes. If these statements end up being correct, fantasy owners simply cannot justify taking a WR in the first five or so rounds in non-PPR that has a ceiling of roughly eight fantasy points per game.

I’m not particularly thrilled with the prospect of owning Daniels this season and I sure can’t imagine drafting him as my TE1. In some drafts, he is being selected right outside the consensus first six TEs and while last year’s stats back that price tag up, his injury history and the depth at the TE position nowadays in fantasy do not. However, if I am presented with the opportunity to draft Daniels at my TE2, count me in.