You’ve heard it said many times. "Develop a game plan and stick to it." Then why is it by season’s end most fantasy managers have failed to execute their "can’t miss" strategy developed during the muggy days of August? Why by week ten have so many thrown in the towel hopelessly abandoning their team for another season?

You started out with good intentions. You did your homework; reading the major preseason publications, visiting every football.com web site imaginable, chatting in a million rooms, and listening to as many radio and television football shows as possible. You knew every dark-horse, rookie, free agent, and superstar who might impact your fantasy team. During the months before training camp began right up until the first opening day kickoff you were open minded to the throng of ideas available from every source conceivable. You read them all (or at least enough) to have succeeded. But you didn’t. Failure certainly wasn’t from a lack of information.

Why then?

I recently came across an excellent article written by Greg Kellogg, which touched on the answer to this perplexing question. In his essay entitled "Expert Status" Mr. Kellogg offers the observation that "you can give up all your knowledge and still beat your opponents." Truer words were never spoken. I honestly believe that I could hand my opening day lineup over to one hundred others and consistently beat most, if not all, of them. How can I be so conceited? For one reason, because it’s my opening day lineup, and as such should have little or no value to anyone other than myself.

Herein lies the paradox for the fantasy player. More information sometimes hurts. Especially when the information is in the form of a prediction from a "expert, a recommendation from a friend, or an opinion from a fellow manager within a chat room. I am not saying that every expert, friend, or casual acquaintance is ignorant to fantasy football. Of course, many know the game quite well. There is plenty of information available from intelligent knowledgeable folks which is good insightful stuff.

But you can run into trouble when you take their advice.

Confused? Don’t be concerned because this is the hardest aspect of fantasy sports to grasp. If you ever wondered what the highly touted "mental part of the game" is all about….this is it! Most importantly, the reason the good managers are competitive year after year and you’re eliminated by Thanksgiving begins with how you handle the vast quantity of recommendations from May till September.

The simple reason most fantasy players don’t succeed is because they listen to anyone with an opinion and, as a result, develop a consensus team comprised of other’s predictions. For example, if XYZFOOTBALL.COM states that Jermaine Lewis is a sleeper this year then, if you’re like many fantasy players, you may pencil him in as a possibility. If JOE THE EXPERT says "watch out for Corey Dillon, then he becomes an immediate prospect for your squad. Or if FOOTBALL INSIDE magazine recommends players from the Seattle Seahawks, well how can anyone ignore them since the publication has been right three years in a row? Pretty soon you develop a team which includes a potpourri of players who were touted by others.

This scenario wouldn’t be half bad except that YOUR TEAM, now has to survive seventeen weeks of ups and downs with a manager who doesn’t really believe in his players because they aren’t YOUR PLAYERS. So when Player A develops a hamstring pull during week three you become upset because you should have known better with his history of injuries. Or when Player B drops a couple of easy passes in a game you become incensed because you always believed he was erratic. As the season progresses you get down on your team because all your personal beliefs concerning each player, whether true or not, are proven to correct over the seventeen game campaign. In other words, because a long football season is characteristically volatile from week to week it is imperative that your team consists of players you choose and believe in. Otherwise you are behind in the mental part of the game.

A perfect example of this is Randy Moss last year. I think we would all agree he had a wonderful season and anybody who owned him from start to finish was lucky indeed. I remember in my league everyone picked him up after his 190 yard Monday night game against the Packers. After that fantastic game he went into a slump where he gained 64, 14, 52, and 6 yards during the next four weeks. I remember all the squawking by opposing managers in the chat room about how they made a mistake jumping too soon on Moss. Many benched him and the rookie delivered for 99, 153, 163, and 106 yards in the ensuring weeks. If you believed after the first Green Bay game that Moss was in the midst of a special season you would have stuck with him. However, if you picked him up on emotion simply because every talk show, website, and chat room gawked over him then you would have benched him at exactly the wrong time.

During a season every player has good and bad weeks. The best method used when distinguishing the difference between a few bad weeks and a fundamental change in a player’s game requires you to remain unemotional and level headed. As the season progresses the key ingredient needed to accurately evaluate each situation is that YOU BELIEVED IN THE PLAYER IN THE FIRST PLACE. If you were unsure then because the player was somebody else’s recommendation how can you possibly determine what course of action to proceed with during a critical midseason decision moment. You are at  a huge disadvantage.

In chat rooms I constantly hear managers say, "if Player A doesn’t produce after the first two weeks, he’s out of my lineup." What kind of strategy is that? At the beginning of the season you need to believe in your team. There are plenty of good reasons to bench a player. Has he slowed down since last year? Is he injured? Has his team taken a step backwards? Is he on the bench? Has his role changed? Is he the victim of poor coaching? A couple of bad games, however, should not be one of them. It’s fine to read what the experts say and listen to other’s opinions, but in the end, the team has to be yours and you need to believe in it.

If this is true then you will have a leg up on your competition in fantasy sports.

Todd Finestone is a staff writer for Fantasy Football Mastermind. His monthly column "FINE STUFF" can be found at several different fantasy football related sites on the Internet. Please click HERE to offer a "Thumbs Up" or "Thumbs Down" on this article. Thank you for taking the time to offer your valuable opinion.