Overrated Eli

He marched his Giants through the playoffs as a wild card team, winning road games against all odds, even going to Brett Favre's house and taking one from the Packers on the very Frozen Tundra of Lambeau Field. He led his team to an unfathomable Super Bowl victory over the previously undefeated New England Patriots that included the most breathtaking play in the game's storied history ("The Escape") and was named Super Bowl MVP. Indeed, Eli Manning had a postseason for the ages, completing 61 percent of his passes while throwing six touchdowns to one interception.

All of which leaves his fantasy football value sky high.

In fact, it leaves his fantasy value too high. Inflation is always a bad thing, whether it's the price of a barrel of crude oil or the cost of a quarterback in your fantasy league. Elisha's postseason heroics have turned a top-15 fantasy quarterback into a top-10 fantasy quarterback on many of the early cheat sheets for 2008, and I may be as guilty as anyone for overreacting and ranking him too high. Actually, scratch that; I'm quite certain I don't have him ranked as highly as fantasy rubes within the greater New Jersey area do. For the record, he is currently eighth on my cheat sheet.

Is Manning really a top-10 quarterback? If you extrapolate his improbable playoff run over a 16-game season, then yes, he absolutely would be. But we all know it's just not that simple. This is a guy who has not thrown for more than 24 touchdowns passes in a season or even come within sniffing distance of 4,000 yards. Maybe, just maybe, his postseason heroics were an indication that he has turned the corner into superstardom and is ready to begin operating at an All-Pro level during the regular season. Then again, maybe Peyton's little brother just had a nice postseason and he is still the same quarterback who has posted virtually identical stats three years in a row and has basically the same supporting cast back with him this year.

For now, I am leaving Eli at number eight in my rankings, but part of the reason for my doing so is that I just don't like most of the other quarterback options. Have you seen what passes as a "starting quarterback" around much of the NFL lately? It's scary. I wouldn't mind hearing from other people how highly they have Eli ranked this year. Please leave a comment and let me know how you feel.