Open Rants by Bagley

These are just a few draft tips in no particular order, ranging from simple to advanced, that I’ve gathered from my decade of playing fantasy football. This guide mostly contains general draft advice, but there are a few tips that pertain specifically to the 2019 season as well.

If you’re new to the game and you’re scrambling for advice because your coworker just asked you to join his league with an odd number of participants, this article is a small step up from a lot of the useful surface level advice you can find on most fantasy websites, but one that will give you a sizable advantage over your competition if your opponents are as new as you. On the other hand, even a seasoned veteran, one with twice the experience I have, will find a few valuable nuggets in here that will provide insight that they hadn’t considered.

Wherever you fall within that spectrum, I hope this guide proves useful to your fantasy football draft for this season.

I. Thou shalt know the rules of thy league.

This one seems blindingly obvious ... and yet there’s always that one guy in my draft room who pipes up “Wait, do we start 2 WRs or 3?” or “Hey, how many points are scored for each passing TD?” halfway through the 5th round. You don’t want to be that guy do you?

Make certain that you know your league rules inside and out before you start drafting. How many starters are there at each position? How many bench spots do you have? Is there an injured reserve spot? Do you have any flex starting positions? If so, are you limited to RB and WR only, or can you use a TE as well? Is it a superflex that allows you to do use a QB? Do you carry any players over to next year? If so, do you have to sacrifice the corresponding pick in the next draft? How long is the regular season, and how many teams make the playoffs? Are there any other quirks that you may not know about?

Read your league rules thoroughly. And then read them again.

II. Thou shalt be aware of irregular drafting tendencies of the members of thy league.

This might not apply to someone who is a 1st year player in their league, but it is quite an advantage to know the habits of the people you’ll be drafting against. Do quarterbacks or tight ends generally get picked earlier or later? When that one knucklehead grabs the Bears defense in round 8, does everyone else panic and follow suit, or laugh it off and continue to build depth at the skill positions? If you don’t know the answers to these questions yet, pay attention and remember for next year.

Even if you’re a rookie to your league, there might be some things to watch out for. Is the league comprised mostly of people from Philadelphia, like my league last year? If so, you’ll need to pay up if you want Carson Wentz or any of his teammates. (On the flip side, I was able to snag some Cowboys, Giants and Redskins for a bargain.) Are the people in your league older or younger? I’ve drafted against people from ages 16 to 60, and I’ve found that old school owners go after consistent production, while the youngsters chase upside.

III. Thou shalt play risk averse early in the draft ...

The old adage is as true as ever: you can’t win your fantasy league in the first few rounds of the draft, but you can certainly lose it there. I’m not telling you to eschew all players who are injured, suspended, or holding out, because those factors are usually baked into their ADP to begin with. All I’m saying is that you should ask yourself this question before you draft such a player: if this player ends up missing a significant amount of time for whatever reason, will my team be alright? The answer to this question may be yes, although it might cost you later. If Todd Gurley or Melvin Gordon slips to the 3rd or 4th round and you’re willing to take that chance, you might consider drafting Darrell Henderson or Austin Ekeler a round or two higher than their ADP, to ensure that you can adjust if things go south.

The Ezekiel Elliott situation is a tricky one, because even if he’s still holding out by the time you draft, I don’t see him falling out of the 1st round, which means that’s where you’ll need to draft him. Are you willing to pass up on an elite WR or 2nd tier RB to take a player who might not even see the field for the whole season? Ask the guy who took Le’Veon Bell with his 1st round pick in last year’s draft, and see what he thinks.

Of course, once you have the foundation of your team filled in, I won’t knock you for taking a chance on Kareem Hunt or A.J. Green in the middle rounds. Just have a backup plan in place.

IV. ... but thou shalt not hesitate to make a splash in the later rounds.

It boggles my mind that guys like Frank Gore and Michael Crabtree are being selected in the last round of fantasy drafts. Yes, they’re household names, but you already know what they’ll give you this season: 300 to 400 yards with a touchdown or two sprinkled in. What is the point of drafting someone like that? There is none, of course.

In the last few rounds, when your starting lineup is filled out and you have a couple of solid backups that can slide in if need be, don’t be afraid to swing for the fences! Grab guys with upside, like rookie backups to injury prone RBs (Damien Harris, Darwin Thompson, Alexander Mattison) or young WRs with breakout potential (Anthony Miller, Tre’Quan Smith, James Washington). There’s even value at QB and TE: both Patrick Mahomes and George Kittle were available in the last few rounds of 2018 drafts.

Heck, if you’re feeling really bold, take a shot on Rob Gronkowski in the last round, assuming your league is reasonably deep. The reigning champs have nothing else at TE, and they’ve lost some WRs as well. There’s a very small chance he suits up, but he has top 5 TE potential if he does, which can’t be said of many other players who will still be there in the last round. You can always kick him to the curb after week 6 or so if he doesn’t work out, and you won’t have missed out on much.

One more thing: when I talk about upside, I’m referring to yearly upside, not weekly upside. A guy like Taylor Gabriel will give you a few monster weeks, but you never know when they’ll occur, and all the rest of his games will be goose eggs. He’s worth a waiver wire dart throw on a week where your starters are injured or on bye, but for goodness’ sake, do not draft him thinking you’re getting a player with “upside”.

V. Thou shalt spy on thy opponents.

This is a trick that even some veteran players aren’t aware of. If you have the 2nd or 3rd pick (or the 2nd to last or 3rd to last pick), you’ll have the chance to pick 2 players almost back to back after every 2 rounds. You should know who both of those players are by the time you need to make your first pick (and if you only know one, don’t select him right away, use as much of your remaining time as you need to figure out who the other player will be). Then with your first pick, take the player that is less likely to make it to your second pick.

Suppose you have the 8th pick in a 10 team league (or equivalently, the 10th pick in a 12 team league). It’s nearing the end of the draft and you still need your starting TE, but there’s a sleeper at another position that you really want as well. You peek at the rosters of the 2 teams picking between your selections, and see that both of them already have their starting TE. Whom do you draft? It’s unlikely that either opponent will choose to grab a 2nd TE, so take your sleeper first, then get your TE on the wrap around. The other teams might not have sniped that sleeper you were eyeing, but why take that risk if you can avoid it at no cost to you?

However, there are times where you might need to deviate from this rule. Let’s say you have the 2nd pick and it’s time to make your round 2 selection. You took a RB in the 1st round, and you want to make it out of the 3rd round with 2 RBs and 1 WR on your roster, but there’s only 1 RB that you would be comfortable taking (let’s say it’s Nick Chubb). For WRs, you prefer Mike Evans, but you would be perfectly happy with either T.Y. Hilton or Keenan Allen. Whom do you select first? Assuming that the owner with the 1st pick already has a RB, you might say to take Evans because he’s more likely to get stolen. But why risk it, if taking Chubb would guarantee that you get one of those 3 WRs (since your opponent can only make 2 picks), which are almost equal in your eyes?

While mock drafts can prepare you for a few of these scenarios, you’ll might have to analyze one on the fly, and make the best possible decision with the time that you have to make your pick.

VI. Thou shalt create a big board for the first 2 rounds (or more).

In rounds 1 and 2 of the draft, you should be drafting the best available player regardless of position, because both players will be in your starting lineup. So why not save yourself the trouble and rank all of the players you might wind up with?

If your league has 10 members, make a top 21 list. If your league has 12 members, make a top 25 list. Basically, just double the number of owners and add 1. (The “add 1” is because you might end up with the 1st pick and have only 1 player remaining on your list by the time you make your 2nd and 3rd round selections, so you may as well plan for that situation because it doesn’t make any difference what order you select the players in.)

If you have a lot of time on your hands, you can extend this concept to the first 3 rounds, but don’t be afraid to deviate from your list if you prefer not to start your draft with 3 straight RBs or 3 straight WRs. Again, triple the number of owners in your league, and add 1. After round 3, you start to draft for need rather than value, so at that point, I would recommend resorting to a separate list of rankings for each individual position.

VII. Thou shalt not be afraid to deviate from ADP rankings.

Quiz time! If you know that the fantasy football community has variable opinions on a particular player, with some valuing him as high as the 6th round but others not willing to touch him until the 10th, where do you think that player will end up being drafted?

If you said the 8th round, slap yourself and try again.

That player will be selected in the 6th round ... if he even makes it that far.

There are websites that list not only the mean ADP of every player on their big board, but also the standard deviation. You don’t want to pass on a player that you badly want in the 6th round because you think he’s a 7th round value, only to get sniped by another owner. This is especially true if you’re drafting at the beginning or the end of the round, because you’ll need to wait a long time for the snake to come back to you. Yes, that player might be 20 spots down on your draft board, but there are 20 or more selections being made between your current pick and your next pick. Don’t be afraid to reach for a player if you think there’s a chance he won’t be there later.

For those who don’t know how standard deviation works, this is all you need to know. Let’s say that 60 is the mean average for where a player is being drafted, and 5 is the standard deviation. Assuming a normal distribution, there’s almost no way that anybody drafts that player before pick 45, and only a 2% chance that he’s taken before pick 50. There’s a 1 in 6 chance that he’s gone before pick 55, and it’s 50-50 whether he makes it to pick 60 (his ADP). If he makes it past his ADP, there’s a 5 in 6 chance someone snatches him before the 65th pick, and a 98% chance he’s gone before pick 70. And there’s basically no chance he falls to 75 or further.

Now if you want that player really badly, where are you going to take him?

Exactly.

VIII. Thou shalt wait on QB and TE (and not even consider DEF or K until the last two rounds).

Note: the following information regarding QBs and TEs does not apply in leagues where each team starts 2 of that position every week.

This is 2019, not 2009. Almost every team in the NFL has a capable starting quarterback. Yes, Mahomes is great and amazing and he throws 80 yard passes behind his back while doing a handstand and all that. But are you really willing to spend a 3rd rounder on him when guys like Jameis Winston can be selected in the double digit rounds? I’m certainly not.

Consider the following (credit to The Fantasy Headliners for these statistics, a link to the relevant YouTube video is at the bottom of this page):

If you were to rank every single QB by the number of fantasy points per game they scored last year, the 5th best QB only finished 2 points per game ahead of the 12th QB. In addition, the 12th QB finished only 1.1 point per game ahead of the 20th QB. In other words, instead of taking the 5th best QB in the early rounds, you could choose to sacrifice 3.1 points per week at the QB position and grab your starting QB in the last few rounds, while flipping that pick for a middle round selection where you could grab your starting flex player or a premier backup.

If you’re still not convinced, here are some more numbers for you. Suppose you decide that since all of the QBs from number 5 to 20 are all the same, you decide that you’ll grab a top 5 guy in 4th or 5th round anyway. How will you know which QB to take? Since 2012, only 5 QBs have had consecutive top 5 finishes in fantasy points per game: Drew Brees and Cam Newton (in 2012 and 2013), Andrew Luck and Peyton Manning (in 2013 and 2014), and Russell Wilson (in 2014 and 2015). Since 2015, none have had back to back top 5 finishes.

Last year, the top 5 QBs off the board according to ADP on FantasyFootballCalculator.com were Aaron Rodgers, Deshaun Watson, Tom Brady, Wilson, and Drew Brees. How did they actually finish? In order, the top 5 QBs were Mahomes, Matt Ryan, Ben Roethlisberger, Watson, and Luck. Watson is the only QB on both lists. This year, the top 5 QBs as of this publishing are Mahomes, Watson, Rodgers, Luck, and Baker Mayfield. Do with that information what you will.

Of course, you can’t wait too long for your QB, because people will start drafting backups. You don’t want to be waffling between Nick Foles and Andy Dalton as your starter.

As for TEs, there is a clear top 3 at the position, with Travis Kelce being consistently selected in the 2nd round and Kittle and Zach Ertz going in the late 3rd and early 4th. O.J. Howard, Evan Engram, and Hunter Henry follow in the 5th and 6th after that. I wouldn’t sacrifice a starter at RB or WR to take one of them, unless they were available at least a full round, maybe even 2, after their ADP. But once those guys are gone, everybody panics and grabs their TE immediately.

The problem is, the position is a barren wasteland after the “big 3” and the “little 3”. Owners are drafting TEs much earlier than they should be as an overreaction to how scarce the position was last year. Again, why take Jared Cook, Eric Ebron, or Vance McDonald in the 7th or 8th round, when similar players can be had later? Austin Hooper is being taken in the 13th round, and he’ll probably be only a fraction of a point per week worse than those guys, and you have an extra 7th or 8th round pick to work with instead of a 13th. That’s a massive upgrade.

As for DEF and K, there’s almost no way to predict how many points they’ll score on a weekly basis. Even Chicago’s defense is no lock to repeat after losing key players in slot CB Bryce Callahan and SS Adrian Amos.

Consider the following analysis from Pro Football Focus Fantasy (a link to the relevant Twitter post is at the bottom of the page). Remember in 2017 when Denver’s No Fly Zone was the stop unit that everyone had to have on their squad? They finished 20th that year, with the relatively unknown Jaguars, who weren’t even drafted in most leagues, finishing atop the rankings. Of course, Sacksonville was predictably overdrafted in 2018, and plummeted to 11th place that year, with the Bears, who were the 10th DEF off the board, took the gold. Still feeling comfortable reaching for them? Didn’t think so.

I’d personally rather just stream DEFs playing terrible offenses such as the Dolphins. As for Ks, they’re essentially random. Again, just grab the highest guy on your board in the last round, or stream Ks that play against terrible defenses. As for which to draft in the second to last round and which to draft in the last round, refer to Commandment V above. If more people picking between your 2 final picks have a DEF than a K, grab a K, and vice versa. In the case of a tie, get your DEF first.

If your draft is early enough, you can even forgo your DEF and/or K entirely (unless your league forces you to draft one of each), and grab a sleeper instead, preferably one where you won’t have to wait long to find out if he’s worth anything or not. For example, you might roll the dice on Tony Pollard in the last round instead of wasting the pick on a K. If Elliott reports to camp by the time you need to set your week 1 lineup, toss Pollard to the side and grab the best K you can find. If Elliott doesn’t report, congratulations, you have the Cowboys’ starting RB! Get rid of someone else and add your K.

Now replace Elliott with Bell and Pollard with James Conner in the above paragraph. That was my philosophy heading into the draft in last year’s fantasy league. Guess who won the league that year.

IX. Thou shalt exercise caution when considering players’ schedules.

This isn’t as big a deal as some of the other items on this list, but it’s still worth mentioning. Many owners avoid drafting several players with the same bye week because they will need to scrounge around for replacements during that week. Others advocate for stacking as many players as possible with a given bye week, so while they’re punting that week away, their team is at full strength for the rest of the season. Personally, the only thing I worry about is whether my top 2 RBs or top 2 WRs have the same bye week if they were my top 2 picks, and try to avoid it if possible. If I have one of each after round 2, that’s fine, I’d rather replace a RB and a WR than 2 at the same position.

The only such player pairs that you could conceivably obtain in the first 2 rounds are Christian McCaffrey and Chubb (7), Alvin Kamara and Joe Mixon (9), David Johnson and Dalvin Cook (12), and Julio Jones and Michael Thomas (9). Let’s address each individually.

For McCaffrey and Chubb or Kamara and Mixon, this situation is only applicable if you have a top 4 pick. If you take McCaffrey or Kamara in the 1st round and you like both of the 2nd round RBs equally, take the one with a different bye week. If he’s gone, just grab your favorite remaining receiver and then take a 3rd tier RB like Leonard Fournette, Marlon Mack, Kerryon Johnson, or Aaron Jones.

David Johnson and Cook are such a risky combination to begin with and the bye is so late in the year that if they’re both still healthy by then, it means that you probably have the inside track on the playoff race anyway.

For Julio Jones and Thomas qualify, if you land one at the end of the first round, it means that other premier talents like Tyreek Hill and JuJu Smith-Schuster are probably still there for the taking, and possibly Mixon and/or Chubb as well.

One more thing regarding leagues where you have to pay a certain amount of money (real or virtual) per transaction: since streaming DEFs and Ks is obviously impossible, prioritize DEFs and Ks with late bye weeks, then dump them midseason for one that’s already had their bye. You don’t want to have the Jets or 49ers DEF or K in week 4 when they’re on bye, and be forced to drop them for another team who has yet to go on bye, and then have to drop that team later. I just saved you a buck. You’re welcome.

X. Thou shalt remain calm and focused during (and after) the draft.

This one is easy to say, but hard to do. Maintaining your composure when things don’t go your way can have a disastrous impact on your draft. Use every second of the draft clock that you need in order to decide the very best pick, and after you’ve made up your mind, see if you can identify 2 or 3 players that you’re hoping will be available at the next pick. Plan ahead!

Another word of caution: don’t be afraid to zig when everyone is zagging. Of course you can make minor adjustments to your draft strategy as the picks come in, but don’t chase after a run on QBs or TEs just because everyone else is (see Commandment VIII).

I selected Newton as my backup QB in 2011, his rookie season, and was trashed relentlessly for the pick. I fell victim to the pressure and dropped him prior to week 1. The ringleader of the mockery immediately picked him up, and was handsomely rewarded with 854 passing yards and 71 rushing yards over the first two weeks, with 3 touchdowns through the air and 2 more on the ground. Newton went on to win the Offensive Rookie of the Year award and a trip to the Pro Bowl, setting a new record for passing yards by a rookie QB (4051) and finishing as the 3rd best fantasy QB that year.

Last year, I was very high on Kittle and drafted him to be my starting TE, but was frustrated when his QB, Jimmy Garoppolo, tore his ACL in week 3, landing him on injured reserve for the rest of the year. I immediately initiated a trade to dump Kittle and one other player and acquire some backups at the skill positions. What did Kittle do after I got rid of him? Oh, nothing much ... just collect 1377 receiving yards, the most ever by a TE, and finish as the 2nd highest scoring fantasy TE that year, 15th regardless of position.

Don’t second guess yourself right after the draft, or give up on your sleepers too early in the season. Your teammates will thoroughly enjoy mocking you for what they think are bad picks. You will thoroughly enjoy seeing your name at the top of the standings because you’re beating the snot out of them. Even if you don’t like the way the draft played out, you can always hope to discover the next Phillip Lindsay on the waiver wire early in the season. Your draft is just the start of your season. Fantasy titles are won in December, not August.

Links:

The Fantasy Headliners: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoYdvbwQ2H skip to 11:39

Pro Football Focus Fantasy: https://www.twitter.com/PFF_Fantasy/status/1156540267102650369