When conducting your
Fantasy Football Draft the best overall advice is to
play it safe early. Don’t try to out smart yourself.
Get your running back early, but then draft a balance
of running and passing throughout the draft and save
your gambles for mid and late rounds. When you do gamble,
focus on running backs.
1. Check your Leagues
Point System before the draft and occasionally
during the season. Obvious, but often ignored. Notice
during the season which categories seem to be manufacturing
a lot of points. If you see a point strength in the
some category make moves for players who excel at that
category. You will be surprised how you can stop a weakness
on your team and turn it into a strength in the league.
Some leagues, like Yahoo Fantasy Football, have a STANDINGS
scoring summary. Use this to analyze strengths and weakness
of categories during the season.
2. Running Backs:
Draft a “sure thing” veteran running back.
You need to know that every week you will get consistent,
top-scoring from one your running backs. Make sure you
look at the running backs ability to score in the red
zone and his ability to catch the ball. Those two factors
are what separate to good fantasy backs from the average
backs. Make sure to grab some extra running backs in
the late rounds. Extra running backs are more important
than any other position because of the lack of change
that happens at the position. Take a gamble on a running
back. A rookie or a back up of a top running team is
a good gamble.
3. Quarterback:
They will generally score the most points in Fantasy
Leagues. The problem is there are only a couple First
allow us to introduce the 4 types of Fantasy QB's: 1)
The Franchise QB. This is the Peyton Manning or Duante
Culpepper of the 2005 Fantasy Football Draft. 2) Fantasy
Stud. These are sure things and have potential to be
a Franchise QB. This would be someone like Donavan Mc
Nabb. 3) The third and most common QB is the Fantasy
Starter. This is your Marc Bulgers, Aaron Brooks, Jake
Plummers and others. Finally, there is the Fantasy Hopefulls.
These are either inconsistent veterans or young QB's.
Brian Griese and Eli Manning fit these bills. You should
put all QB's into these categories to help your draft.
"Franchise QB's" are few and far between in
any given year. It is probably worthwhile to take one
of these ahead of the best running backs. "Fantasy
Studs", which there are few of as well shouldn't
be taken ahead of your #1 running back, unless the flow
of the draft dictates this. "Starting Fantasy QB's"
are the most common QB's. There is a thing line between
Studs, Starters and the "Hopefuls". A Fantasy
Owner is better on drafting a top wide receiver than
a "Fantasy Starter" and at least equal to
drafting a "Stud". The point here is if you
don't draft a "Franchise QB" you are better
to wait unit the mid-rounds to get a "Starter"
quality QB. Either start the run on this type of QB's
if the time is right or grab yours during the run.
4. Wide Receivers:
The first bit of advice on WR's is to go back to the
general draft advice, know your point system. Some leagues
give points for receptions. If your league does, this
gives possesion-type receivers more value. It changes
everything. After that is established, just like at
running backs, you need to get at least one sure-thing
WR. He needs to get the consistent 6-7 catches, 100
yards and a TD. Don't under-estimate the value WR's,
but don't over-estimate them either. There are around
60 wide receivers to choose from, RB, TE and QB have
half of that. After you have a stud, it is almost as
likely to find a second or a third in free agency during
the season as it is to find one in the draft. This is
not to say don't draft more than one, it is to say be
aware of it.
5. Save gambles for middle and late rounds. Plenty
of places for gambles, just not too early.
6. Go into the draft with a small draft plan and some
sleepers. Then throw away your plan. The most important
thing during the draft is to ADAPT! Notice what positions
are and are not being drafted. Can you hold off on drafting
your Quarterback because everyone has already drafted
one? Was there a run on tight ends? You better get one,
even if it is a slightly over-priced player. Go with
the flow of the draft and you will do better than sticking
to a plan. If you are new to drafting and your league
offers an auto-draft option, use it. This will give
you a safely drafted team.
7. Finally, keep an eye on the player's bye weeks.
But even more important, look at when your playoffs
are and check the QB's you are drafting during those
weeks. Make sure one of them has a good match up in
each playoff week. It can mean the difference of a championship
and second place. Also check the running backs, although
they are generally more consistent, playing against
a great defense probably means less TD's. It should
just be another thing you weigh when you are drafting,
not the only reason.
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