These days, most online drafts conclude with an automated evaluation of your team--a letter grade reflecting how strong your team is. I can't remember the last time I scored above a C.
My one draft this year was a 12-team league with unique scoring that disproportionately weights QBs and TEs. There are no kickers or DSTs, there's no trading, and there were 22 rounds. So if you're week at one position, it's glaring and difficult to overcome. The easiest positional deficiency to overcome is at RB, where handcuffs elevate to bell-cow status several times a year.
So my strategy was simple: load up on QBs, WRs, and undervalued TEs, and then grab as many handcuff RBs as I could stash. While I was content with the result, my automated reviewer was not. This is an actual excerpt of my evaluation:
"Coach B.J. Rudell had a poor draft in the recent 2017 #SFB7 Invitational - Villains draft. Their Fantasy Football for Winners - B.J. Rudell (@bjrudell) franchise came away feeling dejected about their bottom grade in the league based on analysis by MyFantasyLeague.com. . . . After such a pathetic draft grade, coach B.J. Rudell is motivated to prove to the league that their picks will overachieve and bring home the trophy."
Does this look familiar to any of you? Have you ever completed a draft, felt good about it, and then been informed that it sucked?
I've cautioned many people over the years that these ratings are largely meaningless. Sure, any of us can make bad draft decisions. But these automated grades are based on rigid rankings determined by someone or a group of someones we don't even know. What makes them smarter than us? And sometimes these rankings are several weeks old, making them, at best, moderately irrelevant.
Getting a good grade requires us to adhere strictly to their rankings, drafting the best remaining player on their list. That's not fantasy football for winners. That's sleepwalking through a draft.
We know that with many of our opponents using the same or similar rankings to pick their players, the art of great drafting--and of excellent in-season team management--is identifying undervalued guys and avoiding overvalued ones. It means looking dumb in the short term because there's a high probability of looking smart down the road.
In the past few weeks, MyFantasyLeague.com's player rankings have shifted. Previously viewed as a last-place team, my roster now ranks 5th out of 12, while my starters are ranked 2nd. "Reaching" for Dez Bryant, Coby Fleener, and Marqise Lee seems more sensible today than it did in July. Zay Jones in the 15th round, Kenny Golladay in the 19th, and Wendell Smallwood in the 22nd are now viewed as potential steals.
This is not meant to artificially prop up my team. I have a lot of work to do this season, and injuries and other factors could wreak havoc on my roster. But it's a reminder that draft grades are meaningless. They are snapshots in time--irrelevant the moment they're handed down. The key is rejecting outside pressures, and instead making research-based decisions we can stand by. For if everyone drafted based on the same rankings, there would be no steals, and everyone would get an A.
Who would want that?
My one draft this year was a 12-team league with unique scoring that disproportionately weights QBs and TEs. There are no kickers or DSTs, there's no trading, and there were 22 rounds. So if you're week at one position, it's glaring and difficult to overcome. The easiest positional deficiency to overcome is at RB, where handcuffs elevate to bell-cow status several times a year.
So my strategy was simple: load up on QBs, WRs, and undervalued TEs, and then grab as many handcuff RBs as I could stash. While I was content with the result, my automated reviewer was not. This is an actual excerpt of my evaluation:
"Coach B.J. Rudell had a poor draft in the recent 2017 #SFB7 Invitational - Villains draft. Their Fantasy Football for Winners - B.J. Rudell (@bjrudell) franchise came away feeling dejected about their bottom grade in the league based on analysis by MyFantasyLeague.com. . . . After such a pathetic draft grade, coach B.J. Rudell is motivated to prove to the league that their picks will overachieve and bring home the trophy."
Does this look familiar to any of you? Have you ever completed a draft, felt good about it, and then been informed that it sucked?
I've cautioned many people over the years that these ratings are largely meaningless. Sure, any of us can make bad draft decisions. But these automated grades are based on rigid rankings determined by someone or a group of someones we don't even know. What makes them smarter than us? And sometimes these rankings are several weeks old, making them, at best, moderately irrelevant.
Getting a good grade requires us to adhere strictly to their rankings, drafting the best remaining player on their list. That's not fantasy football for winners. That's sleepwalking through a draft.
We know that with many of our opponents using the same or similar rankings to pick their players, the art of great drafting--and of excellent in-season team management--is identifying undervalued guys and avoiding overvalued ones. It means looking dumb in the short term because there's a high probability of looking smart down the road.
In the past few weeks, MyFantasyLeague.com's player rankings have shifted. Previously viewed as a last-place team, my roster now ranks 5th out of 12, while my starters are ranked 2nd. "Reaching" for Dez Bryant, Coby Fleener, and Marqise Lee seems more sensible today than it did in July. Zay Jones in the 15th round, Kenny Golladay in the 19th, and Wendell Smallwood in the 22nd are now viewed as potential steals.
This is not meant to artificially prop up my team. I have a lot of work to do this season, and injuries and other factors could wreak havoc on my roster. But it's a reminder that draft grades are meaningless. They are snapshots in time--irrelevant the moment they're handed down. The key is rejecting outside pressures, and instead making research-based decisions we can stand by. For if everyone drafted based on the same rankings, there would be no steals, and everyone would get an A.
Who would want that?