Who are you drafting? No, really: who should know who you're drafting. If you're doing a snake draft, the deeper you go, the more control you have over who you take. And in an auction draft, if you're realistic about how many expensive players you want, you can run the table on 10 or more players depending on league size.
One of the reasons I started this blog was because I was tired of hearing complaining. Want to draft someone? Then draft him. Miss out? Tough luck.
The problem is, too often we try to thread the needle--waiting a round too late to grab a guy we think will fall to us. We want bargains. We want to beat our opponents in the draft, rather than focusing on beating them during the season.
At its most basic, effective draft prep is a three-step process. First, identify rankings that work for you. A couple hundred of you have been checking out the FF4W rankings; fantastic. Thousands of you are probably keeping an eye on major-site rankings like ESPN's or Yahoo's or CBS Sports' or Fantasy Pros'. Whatever works for you, use it. And many (maybe most) of you have shared that you use a combination of other people's rankings and your own. Again, fantastic. No one has all the answers. So come up with as many as you can find, where you find 'em.
Second, document your rankings. Don't rely on three separate spreadsheets. Pull everything together into a cohesive, rank-ordered list. In the FF4W Premier League, we have 30 seconds to draft. We've got to know exactly who we want when it's our turn. Even if you have 60 or even 90 seconds, fumbling between multiple documents sometimes won't cut it. If you're in a 12-team league with 16 players per team, 192 guys are coming off the board. So your rankings should include at least that many players.
Third, identify every overvalued and undervalued player compared to ADP. This is both time-consuming and necessary. My top-300 sheet highlights 299 overvalued or undervalued players. That's right: with the exception of Saquon Barkley (#1 overall) each player on my sheet is ranked slightly, moderately, or significantly different than their ADP. About half are moderately-to-significantly undervalued or overvalued. This is critical. Because when it's your turn, you have to know not only all the guys you want, but how much you want to reach for them.
And back to the "complaining" part of drafting: reaching is often an essential maneuver. Last year Christian McCaffrey's overall ADP was 15. Some believe believed he should be a top-6 overall pick. If you were in that camp, and you had the 10th pick in the first round and the 15th coming back down, what do you do? Pick someone else in the first and hope CMC falls in your lap in round 2? Of course not. You've already identified him as a bargain at pick 10. There's probably a 50-50 chance he won't be there at pick 15. So take the value: draft CMC.
Now, if you had the 11th and 14th picks, your odds for waiting are slightly better. Maybe you play those odds and take Melvin Gordon (overall 12 ADP) and hope your opponent doesn't bite. Then again, in 2018 the next best two RBs based on ADP were Dalvin Cook and CMC. So taking Gordon might prompt your opponent to take the two "next best" RBs.
These are the things to consider every single round in the run-up to your pick and when you're on the clock. If you believe in your rankings (and you need to believe in your rankings, or else what's the point), don't get cute. Don't think you're smarter than you were an hour before when you finalized those rankings. If Player A is valued as an eighth rounder, and if you believe he's actually worth a fifth rounder, then take him in the sixth. Small victory, but a victory if you believe in your research. Because for all you know, one of your opponents also thinks Player A is undervalued, and might snag him if he falls to the seventh. That's what I mean by not getting cute: better to cash in on value a little too early than miss out on value a little too late.
Finally, whether a snake or auction, you have to know which players you absolutely want on your roster. This goes beyond simply identifying undervalued players. It's about prioritizing. As the summer's gone on, my priority list has gradually taken shape. I'm competing against some of you in the Premier League, so obviously it's never good to over-share with opponents. But whatever.
I really, really want Jared Goff. Might turn out to be completely misguided. But I want him starting for me. On average he's the ninth QB coming off draft boards, somewhere around the seventh or eighth round. I think he'll be a top-3 QB. So if take him as the sixth or seventh QB off the board, fantastic. Could I wait another round? Maybe. But why would I risk it? Since I believe in him, I believe in the value I'm locking in by grabbing him a bit early. There are also several RB handcuffs / complementary backs I want on my team, like Jaylen Samuels, Alexander Mattison, Darwin Thompson, and Chase Edmonds. I know when they'll probably go in the draft, and I know some of my opponents will want to reach for some of them too. So I need to be prepared to reach even sooner. If I want them badly enough, I'll roster them, even if it means starting my non-starter RB collection in the eighth or ninth round.
In auction drafts, you have full control over guys like Goff and Samuels and Thompson and any other back-end starter or bench player. Because once you get past the top 30-40 players, you can pick and choose which guys you want. So there are no excuses for randomly adding a WR4 or backup TE. If you know who you want, get who you want. No complaining. No excuses. Just do it.
If you come in prepared, drafts are easy. Maybe you don't get everyone you want, but if you have 60 undervalued players on your radar, it's impossible to get everyone you want. Get 16 players from that list of 60, and you should walk away happy.
Yes, it's that easy if you put in the work.
---
Sign up for Pre-Draft Top 300 Rankings: http://www.fantasyfootballforwinners.com/
Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/_FF4W
One of the reasons I started this blog was because I was tired of hearing complaining. Want to draft someone? Then draft him. Miss out? Tough luck.
The problem is, too often we try to thread the needle--waiting a round too late to grab a guy we think will fall to us. We want bargains. We want to beat our opponents in the draft, rather than focusing on beating them during the season.
At its most basic, effective draft prep is a three-step process. First, identify rankings that work for you. A couple hundred of you have been checking out the FF4W rankings; fantastic. Thousands of you are probably keeping an eye on major-site rankings like ESPN's or Yahoo's or CBS Sports' or Fantasy Pros'. Whatever works for you, use it. And many (maybe most) of you have shared that you use a combination of other people's rankings and your own. Again, fantastic. No one has all the answers. So come up with as many as you can find, where you find 'em.
Second, document your rankings. Don't rely on three separate spreadsheets. Pull everything together into a cohesive, rank-ordered list. In the FF4W Premier League, we have 30 seconds to draft. We've got to know exactly who we want when it's our turn. Even if you have 60 or even 90 seconds, fumbling between multiple documents sometimes won't cut it. If you're in a 12-team league with 16 players per team, 192 guys are coming off the board. So your rankings should include at least that many players.
Third, identify every overvalued and undervalued player compared to ADP. This is both time-consuming and necessary. My top-300 sheet highlights 299 overvalued or undervalued players. That's right: with the exception of Saquon Barkley (#1 overall) each player on my sheet is ranked slightly, moderately, or significantly different than their ADP. About half are moderately-to-significantly undervalued or overvalued. This is critical. Because when it's your turn, you have to know not only all the guys you want, but how much you want to reach for them.
And back to the "complaining" part of drafting: reaching is often an essential maneuver. Last year Christian McCaffrey's overall ADP was 15. Some believe believed he should be a top-6 overall pick. If you were in that camp, and you had the 10th pick in the first round and the 15th coming back down, what do you do? Pick someone else in the first and hope CMC falls in your lap in round 2? Of course not. You've already identified him as a bargain at pick 10. There's probably a 50-50 chance he won't be there at pick 15. So take the value: draft CMC.
Now, if you had the 11th and 14th picks, your odds for waiting are slightly better. Maybe you play those odds and take Melvin Gordon (overall 12 ADP) and hope your opponent doesn't bite. Then again, in 2018 the next best two RBs based on ADP were Dalvin Cook and CMC. So taking Gordon might prompt your opponent to take the two "next best" RBs.
These are the things to consider every single round in the run-up to your pick and when you're on the clock. If you believe in your rankings (and you need to believe in your rankings, or else what's the point), don't get cute. Don't think you're smarter than you were an hour before when you finalized those rankings. If Player A is valued as an eighth rounder, and if you believe he's actually worth a fifth rounder, then take him in the sixth. Small victory, but a victory if you believe in your research. Because for all you know, one of your opponents also thinks Player A is undervalued, and might snag him if he falls to the seventh. That's what I mean by not getting cute: better to cash in on value a little too early than miss out on value a little too late.
Finally, whether a snake or auction, you have to know which players you absolutely want on your roster. This goes beyond simply identifying undervalued players. It's about prioritizing. As the summer's gone on, my priority list has gradually taken shape. I'm competing against some of you in the Premier League, so obviously it's never good to over-share with opponents. But whatever.
I really, really want Jared Goff. Might turn out to be completely misguided. But I want him starting for me. On average he's the ninth QB coming off draft boards, somewhere around the seventh or eighth round. I think he'll be a top-3 QB. So if take him as the sixth or seventh QB off the board, fantastic. Could I wait another round? Maybe. But why would I risk it? Since I believe in him, I believe in the value I'm locking in by grabbing him a bit early. There are also several RB handcuffs / complementary backs I want on my team, like Jaylen Samuels, Alexander Mattison, Darwin Thompson, and Chase Edmonds. I know when they'll probably go in the draft, and I know some of my opponents will want to reach for some of them too. So I need to be prepared to reach even sooner. If I want them badly enough, I'll roster them, even if it means starting my non-starter RB collection in the eighth or ninth round.
In auction drafts, you have full control over guys like Goff and Samuels and Thompson and any other back-end starter or bench player. Because once you get past the top 30-40 players, you can pick and choose which guys you want. So there are no excuses for randomly adding a WR4 or backup TE. If you know who you want, get who you want. No complaining. No excuses. Just do it.
If you come in prepared, drafts are easy. Maybe you don't get everyone you want, but if you have 60 undervalued players on your radar, it's impossible to get everyone you want. Get 16 players from that list of 60, and you should walk away happy.
Yes, it's that easy if you put in the work.
---
Sign up for Pre-Draft Top 300 Rankings: http://www.fantasyfootballforwinners.com/
Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/_FF4W