You all know how to draft. And there are always ways to do better. A lot of it is luck. You could draft CMC at #1 and then Justin Jefferson and A.J. Brown at the round 2-3 turn. Then three weeks in, Jefferson and Brown are out for two months, and you're regretting not taking CEH and Darren Waller.
Of course, we can't control luck, so we can't draft based on luck. But there's also a clear skill component. I want to take a minute to walk through a few often underappreciated approaches to auction drafting. Even if you don't do auctions, some of these approaches translate to snake drafts.
I go into drafts knowing exactly who I want. In a snake draft, I can control for some of this. In auctions, I can control almost all of it, as long as I set clear expectations. Every player nomination, every bid, and every decision to pass on a player must be deliberate. I urge people to write down 30 or more of the most undervalued players. Which of those 14-16 players (or more depending on your roster size) do you want?
My annual rankings highlight the degree to which I think players are under- and overvalued. If someone's overvalued, I'm not even considering drafting them. What's the point? If Dalvin Cook's market price in a $200 auction draft is $65, and I've got him pegged at $52, then there's no reasonable way I'm getting him for $52. So no need to think twice about it. Let your opponents fight over him. You need to focus on your targets, and only your targets.
And your targets should include as many $1 bargains as you can find. Managers who stock up on $5-$10 players usually aren't maximizing value (though there are exceptions, like $5 bargain QBs such as Aaron Rodgers and Russell Wilson). Elite players win us titles. It's hard to know which $5-$10 guy will break through. So that's a lot of dice rolling. I did my first mock auction draft of the summer recently and landed two likely top-8 RBs for $112, two likely WR1s for $62, a likely top-8 QB for $5, and a likely top-6 TE for $6. That left me with $15 for nine guys. That was plenty.
Because I had my list of $1 bargains. Some I was willing to pay $2 for. But as long as I was patient, I could snag several of them when most of my opponents were almost out of cash: Henry Ruggs and A.J. Dillon for $2, Marquez Callaway and Tony Pollard for $1. And so on. In any draft, I'm trying to produce a top-heavy roster with 3-4 exceptional positional players, and plenty of very-high-upside bargains, including RB handcuffs and undervalued #1 wideouts. The odds are always good that at least a couple of these guys will end up as weekly starters. So a lineup with 3-4 elite or near-elite players could grow to 5-6. A nearly unbeatable lineup.
And never, ever, ever bid on a player you want until near the end of an auction draft. Nominating Pollard midway through is an invitation for a bidding war--especially if someone else has Zeke Elliott (which is why at least two of the handcuffs you target should be for starting RBs you're also targeting, so that no other manager feels as much urgency to outbid you). Nominate Cole Beasley (not to pick on Beasley, but still . . .). Nominate someone you don't need, and whose price is comfortably above $1 so that others will rush to outbid you--and drain a little more of their resources.
There's no perfect draft, because we won't know the real results for months. But there are better and worse ways to draft. And knowing who you want, what you're willing pay, and when it's right to strike are the keys to controlling your fate.
Looking forward to hearing your strategies on the Facebook blog.
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Personalized Fantasy Advice Sign-up: www.fantasyfootballforwinners.com/p/personalized-fantasy-advice.html
Preseason Draft Rankings Sign-up: www.fantasyfootballforwinners.com/p/preseason-rankings.html
Of course, we can't control luck, so we can't draft based on luck. But there's also a clear skill component. I want to take a minute to walk through a few often underappreciated approaches to auction drafting. Even if you don't do auctions, some of these approaches translate to snake drafts.
I go into drafts knowing exactly who I want. In a snake draft, I can control for some of this. In auctions, I can control almost all of it, as long as I set clear expectations. Every player nomination, every bid, and every decision to pass on a player must be deliberate. I urge people to write down 30 or more of the most undervalued players. Which of those 14-16 players (or more depending on your roster size) do you want?
My annual rankings highlight the degree to which I think players are under- and overvalued. If someone's overvalued, I'm not even considering drafting them. What's the point? If Dalvin Cook's market price in a $200 auction draft is $65, and I've got him pegged at $52, then there's no reasonable way I'm getting him for $52. So no need to think twice about it. Let your opponents fight over him. You need to focus on your targets, and only your targets.
And your targets should include as many $1 bargains as you can find. Managers who stock up on $5-$10 players usually aren't maximizing value (though there are exceptions, like $5 bargain QBs such as Aaron Rodgers and Russell Wilson). Elite players win us titles. It's hard to know which $5-$10 guy will break through. So that's a lot of dice rolling. I did my first mock auction draft of the summer recently and landed two likely top-8 RBs for $112, two likely WR1s for $62, a likely top-8 QB for $5, and a likely top-6 TE for $6. That left me with $15 for nine guys. That was plenty.
Because I had my list of $1 bargains. Some I was willing to pay $2 for. But as long as I was patient, I could snag several of them when most of my opponents were almost out of cash: Henry Ruggs and A.J. Dillon for $2, Marquez Callaway and Tony Pollard for $1. And so on. In any draft, I'm trying to produce a top-heavy roster with 3-4 exceptional positional players, and plenty of very-high-upside bargains, including RB handcuffs and undervalued #1 wideouts. The odds are always good that at least a couple of these guys will end up as weekly starters. So a lineup with 3-4 elite or near-elite players could grow to 5-6. A nearly unbeatable lineup.
And never, ever, ever bid on a player you want until near the end of an auction draft. Nominating Pollard midway through is an invitation for a bidding war--especially if someone else has Zeke Elliott (which is why at least two of the handcuffs you target should be for starting RBs you're also targeting, so that no other manager feels as much urgency to outbid you). Nominate Cole Beasley (not to pick on Beasley, but still . . .). Nominate someone you don't need, and whose price is comfortably above $1 so that others will rush to outbid you--and drain a little more of their resources.
There's no perfect draft, because we won't know the real results for months. But there are better and worse ways to draft. And knowing who you want, what you're willing pay, and when it's right to strike are the keys to controlling your fate.
Looking forward to hearing your strategies on the Facebook blog.
---
Personalized Fantasy Advice Sign-up: www.fantasyfootballforwinners.com/p/personalized-fantasy-advice.html
Preseason Draft Rankings Sign-up: www.fantasyfootballforwinners.com/p/preseason-rankings.html