My Draft Strategy (2 Dynasty Rookie Drafts)

Dynasty/Devy Leagues
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I am currently working on my 2022 rankings and the draft strategy for my 2 main dynasty leagues. Both leagues will draft only in July - I hate it, but what can you do.

For mock drafts, I use www.fantasymocks.com. It’s a very helpful tool, though it’s based on ADP only and does not consider current rosters in your league.

League 1
12 team, half PPR, SFLEX
Current roster:
QB: P Mahomes, J Herbert, M Trubisky, G Minshew, J Love
RB: A Ekeler, J Jacobs, D Harris (NE), M Carter, S Michel
WR: J Chase, D Johnson (PIT), A Cooper, G Davis, DJ Chark, J Meyers, M Hardman, KJ Osborn, J Palmer
TE: P Freiermuth, D Arnold (JAX)

Picks: 1.01, 1.12, 2.01, 2.12, 3.04, 4.01
Drafting rookies only.

Strategy:

1.01
Breece Hall, no questions asked.

1.12 & 2.01
I expect at least 1 QB and 2 RBs to come off the board between the 1.02 and the 1.11. We have 2 very QB-needy teams, and the league tends to be very RB-heavy in drafts, so it could be even more.
My plan is to draft 1 RB and 1 WR with these 2 consecutive picks. On the RB side, I am eyeing Isaiah Spiller, who would serve as both a handcuff and a potential successor for my Austin Ekeler.
On the WR side, the choice could come down to Pickens or Dotson, in which case I would pick the former. I have Diontae, who may move on next year. So again, Pickens would serve as both a handcuff and a potential successor for one of my starters. But knowing my league, I wouldn’t be surprised if only 2-3 WRs are picked in the first round, in which case I might even go after 2 WRs with these picks. Last year, I got Chase at 1.09, as the first WR to come off the board.

2.12 & 3.04
My priority at this point of the draft will be on RB. TDP and Hassan Haskins are 2 players I am quite high on. Davis-Price is a lottery ticket, but with huge upside. So is Haskins, who is one injury of an ageing high-volume RB away from becoming very fantasy relevant.
If both players are gone already, there should be some interesting WRs left on the board. Jalen Tolbert is one of my favorites around this time.

4.01
Romeo Doubs and Khalil Shakir are my favorites for my final pick. Velus Jones and Danny Gray could be intriguing options as well, though I don’t like their team situation. Cade Otton is another player that I like a lot, but I’m speculating that he will end up on the waiver wire.

League 2
12 team, full PPR, single QB
Current roster:
QB: T Lance, J Winston, D Jones
RB: T Etienne, R Jones, S Michel, JD McKissic ,K Gainwell, N Hines
WR: J Chase, M Pittman, J Waddle, J Meyers, V Jefferson (LAR), KJ Osborn, L Shenault
TE: D Schultz, P Freiermuth

Picks: 2.02, 2.09, 3.04, 4.02, 5.02

Strategy:
This one is obvious - I need startable RBs. Not the easiest situation without a 1st round pick, but here we are.

We draft rookies and free agents in this league, but the only interesting free agent is Tim Patrick, who will probably come off the board some time in the second round. So my focus will be entirely on rookies.

2.02
I expect at least Hall, Walker and James Cook to be off the board by this time. My selection may come down to what’s left of R White, I Spiller, D Pierce and T Allgeier. My favorite of this group is Dameon Pierce, as he has the best chance to become an immediate contributor. He may not be more than a low-end RB2, but that’s still an upgrade for my team.

2.09
If I am very lucky, Allgeier will still be there. If not, the choice will be down to Hassan Haskins, TDP or Keaontay Ingram. In that case, I’d pick Haskins.

3.04
Unless Zamir White falls down this far, I don’t expect an interesting RB option to be available anymore, so I will go after players like Jalen Tolbert, Khalil Shakir or Romeo Doubs here.

4.02 & 5.02
Best available RB/WR/TE. Snoop Conner is an option, as a handcuff for my Travis Etienne. Jerome Ford, Tyler Badie, Velus Jones or Greg Dulcich are other players I could see myself drafting at this point.

That’s it. Draft day can’t come soon enough. Looking forward to hearing your feedback on my draft thoughts.

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“In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”–Dwight Eisenhower

League 1 first…

Your 1.01 is without argument. It’s what I am doing in my own league.

On the 1.12 and 2.01 consecutive picks, I’m not sure you need an RB here. After getting Hall, you have a decent RB corps. I’d wait and take a gamble on RB later. Here, I’d look at either 2 WR’s, or even a QB, if you see s good one drop to here (Matt Corral?). Remember, in SFLEX, you can never have too many good QB’s.

On 2.12 and 3.04, I agree completely, although keep your eyes open should a good WR drop to here. Like you said, Tolbert is a strong candidate here, as well as Alec Pierce.

On the 4.01, if nothing of interest drops to here, keep your eyes open for a TE lottery ticket. Most of the TE’s in this class are all potentially great, or potential busts. It could be worth a shot this late in the draft.

League 2…

Of the ones you named at 2.02 and 2.09, I like Spiller and Allgeier the best, but especially Allgeier. The Falcons are in desperate need for an RB to spell Patterson, and Allgeier fills that need perfectly. On the other hand, Spiller will still be playing second fiddle to Ekeler this season. Also, Allgeier has the perfect RB coach in Arthur Smith. Haskins is a solid pick at 2.09.

At 3.04, go after Zamir White if you can. The writing is on the wall for Josh Jacobs, and White will get his chance. If not, Tolbert is an excellent choice, although I doubt he’ll see the light of day with your top WR’s. He could be nice trade bait later though.

As for your later picks, I like Badie as a dark horse. The Ravens love to pound the rock, and he suits their system well, even if he is buried on the depth chart. Don’t ignore Jets TE Jeremy Ruckert. While he was primarily a run blocking TE in college, Ohio State had an awesome WR corps, which kept Ruckert from producing much receiving work. He will see the field a lot just for his run blocking, which could produce opportunities for him, especially being a big target in the red zone. Always a plus.

GL with your drafts!

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Love that quote in this context! :sweat_smile:

Thanks a lot for the feedback, much appreciated.

As for the QBs, I have to admit I’m not a fan of the 2022 class. In my SFLEX league, if one of the top 4 is still on the board at the end of round 2, I will consider him as a value pick. But I expect QBs to be in high demand in that league, and my plan is to add another quality QB in the 1st round of 2023.

After a brief moment of shock, I’m now quite happy that Mahomes and Herbert share the same bye week. It means I will have to stream a QB that week and put an RB/WR on SFLEX. But I’m playing one of the weaker teams that week, so I may still have a chance to win that matchup. And I will have both my starters available for the other 13 weeks.

I like Ruckert, but in most mocks and actual drafts I followed, he was drafted in the 3rd round, and that’s too early for my liking. My personal TE favorites this year are Daniel Bellinger (NYG) and Cade Otton (TBB). Both might be available on the waiver wire after the draft, so I’d not even have to spend a pick on them.

Bellinger could become an immediate contributor, as the Giants have need on that position. They have added Ricky Seals-Jones and Jordan Akins, but Bellinger should at least have a chance to carve out an immediate role there.

Otton is generally undervalued, as managers are concerned that Gronk will come back. I’m not, because it makes no difference. Brady will hardly involve a rookie TE anyway, so Otton is a stash for 2023 and beyond anyway. If Gronk will come back, you can probably take a gamble and leave Otton on the waiver wire until the end of the 2022 season.

Btw, slightly off-topic: if you are looking for a TE sleeper, bookmark Washington’s John Bates. He’s still stuck behind Logan Thomas, but Thomas had trouble staying healthy, and is generally overrated, if you ask me. Bates looked solid last year, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he can carve out a greater role this year, especially since RSJ is gone now.

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You mentioned Ricky Seals-Jones, and I must admit to a weakness for him. I still feel if you put him with the right QB, and he could easily have double-digit TD’s!

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Same here. I streamed him a few times last season, while Thomas was injured, and he never disappointed. I only have 2 TEs (Freiermuth & Dan Arnold) in my main league, and thought about adding Cade Otton for the Taxi Squad and RSJ for the bench in free agency.

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Picks 1.12 and 2.01. I’d be going with WR and drafting RB later. Spiller is the only RB I would consider that early. But RB like Zamir White or James Cook might be starters in 2023 with Jacobs and Singletary contracts expiring

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James Cook could be off the board in that league as early as 1.03. I did a custom mock draft now, considering team needs and known preferences of the owners, and it came out like this:

1.01 Breece Hall (me)
1.02 Ken Walker
1.03 James Cook
1.04 Treylon Burks (owner doesn’t like the Falcons)
1.05 Kenny Pickett
1.06 Desmond Ridder or Matt Corral
1.07 Isaiah Spiller
1.08 Matt Corral or Desmond Ridder (depending on the 1.06)
1.09 Drake London
1.10 Garrett Wilson
1.11 Chris Olave or Skyy Moore

That would indeed lead to me drafting 2 WRs. Olave/Moore, depending on who’s left (or both, if yet another owner passed on WRs). And then either Christian Watson or Jahan Dotson.

I might also try to convert the 1.12 into a 2023 1st. Can’t have too many 1sts in next year’s draft.

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When I drafted Zamir White in the first round, after Hall and Walker were taken, I got a chuckle when I got asked if that was really my pick. White has a straight pass to starting with Jacobs being on the backside of his career after Gruden ran him into the ground. White will get his opportunity, now he just has to take advantage of it.

Spiller is the only other one I might consider, but I just have a nagging suspicion about him that I can’t shake. Something I saw on his film that I can’t put a finger on.

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When in doubt, that is a great strategy. Also, next year’s draft is allegedly supposed to be awesome. I tend to look at one-year-away-preseason-draft-hype with a large amount of skepticism, so the awesomeness is still in question, but in general the trading a last pick in the 1st round this year for an unknown pick in next year’s draft has potential, if you can find a taker.

Personally, I never trade 1st round picks away, unless I get a too-good-to-be-true deal, and a late 1st round pick this year ain’t it. I’m a fairly decent scout of college talent, so a 1st round pick is just gold to me.

This is the year to draft rookie WR’s, and that looks like solid strategy. If you can grab Olave, Moore, or Watson, you should be good. I’d avoid Dotsun. Washington has a history of ruining a sunny day with good rookies.

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Why do I even spend time on draft strategies if the other owners refuse to cooperate? :sweat_smile:

6 picks into the draft in League 2, and 4 RBs are off the board already. Draft went B Hall - K Walker - D London - T Burks - J Cook - R White.

Ironically, the 2 teams that reached for Cook and White aren’t even RB-needy. The teams that drafted London and Burks were.

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For what it’s worth, I hear good things about Allgeier out of Falcons training camp.

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No other RBs came off the board in the second half of the first round. As the team drafting ahead of me had already picked Breece Hall with the 1.01, was now pretty stacked on RB (Najee, Akers, Hall, Singletary), but has huge gaps on WR (Amari Cooper is best asset there), I was fairly sure he’d take George Pickens and leave my prime target, Dameon Pierce, for me.

Of course, he didn’t, and took Pierce. :face_with_symbols_over_mouth:

So now I have to decide if I take Pickens, who’s a solid value pick at 2.02. Or reach for Spiller or Allgeier to address my need for RBs. But neither of them should come off the board that early in the second round.

I pick again at 2.09, so I strongly lean towards taking Pickens now, and then adding whoever is left of Spiller / B Robinson / T Allgeier / Z White / TDP at 2.09 Should all 5 of those RBs be taken between 2.03 and 2.08, then Jalen Tolbert will be left on the board, which would also be fine with me.

Edit: now I got an offer to trade the 2.02 away for Miles Sanders. I’m not a fan of Sanders at all, but he’s certainly not worse than the RB options left on the board now. Plus, I have Kenny Gainwell in that league, so I even have him handcuffed.

Will pull the trigger on that one.
Scratch that. I resisted the temptation, rejected the offer and chose Pickens. Sanders isn’t the solution for my RB problem. Neither was any of the RBs still on the board.

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It sounds like you can still get a good RB at 2.09, and maybe a second one in the third round.

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Robinson and Spiller came off the board right after my pick. 3 picks until I’m back on the clock, and Allgeier, Zamir White and TDP are still there. If all 3 of them are being picked next, I’ll pick Jalen Tolbert and lose no sleep over it.

If one of them remains, it will probably mean Tolbert was taken. Which also makes this an easy decision.

If one of the RBs AND Tolbert remain, I will have my next decision to make. I’m okay with any of the 3 RBs late in the 2nd round. But I’m really high on Tolbert…

Gotta follow my own advice: you draft for talent, you trade for need.

Edit: 2.05 picked Pierre Strong. Didn’t see that one coming.

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League 1 draft couldn’t have gone much better.

1.01 - Breece Hall, that one was easy.

Had traded the 1.12 + Pat Freiermuth for Mark Andrews, which made me very happy.

2.01 - George Pickens. Selected him over Christian Watson, whom I don’t believe in. Just a few minutes ago, the Steelers did a non-Steeler thing and extended Diontae, which puts a damper on the short-term outlook for Pickens. But the long-term perspective is still there.

2.12 - Jalen Tolbert. Couldn’t believe he fell that far. Alec Pierce was also still there, who is in a quite similar situation. But I like Tolbert a tad better. I had considered Zamir White for this pick, as I have Josh Jacobs in that league, but couldn’t pass on a value pick like Tolbert. I hoped for White staying on the board for 4 more picks, but he went at 3.02. So at…

3.04 - I took Tyrion Davis-Price. Yes, he’s a complete lottery ticket. But in the middle of the 3rd round, I’m fine with that. I had briefly considered taking Romeo Doubs instead. Good that I didn’t, because…

4.01 - Romeo Doubs. Early reports from TC sound very promising. I don’t think he’ll go through the roof, but I can see a situation where he may have some FLEX appeal (and outperform Christian Watson).

Overall, I’m very happy with how this draft went. I’m in a good position now to try and defend my title.

12 team, half PPR, SFLEX
Current roster:
QB: P Mahomes, J Herbert, M Trubisky, G Minshew, J Love
RB: A Ekeler, B Hall, J Jacobs, D Harris (NE), R Stevenson, M Carter, S Michel, T Davis-Price, K Nwangwu (MIN)
WR: J Chase, D Johnson (PIT), G Davis, A Cooper, J Tolbert, G Pickens, DJ Chark, J Meyers, M Hardman, KJ Osborn, J Palmer, R Doubs
TE: M Andrews, D Arnold (JAX)
K: T Bass (BUF)
DST: Buffalo Bills

I hope that Daniel Bellinger (TE/NYG) goes undrafted (4th round is still in progress), then I will scoop him up off waivers after the draft. If not, I think about adding either Derrius Guice (RB/FA) as a speculation stash, or Julius Chestnut (RB/TEN) as a deep sleeper.

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Another thing to consider is the Steelers history with WR’s. It seems like they pull them out of a magic hat they have stored somewhere. Even if Pickens is some kind of slow starter, the Steelers WILL turn him into a great receiver, or at least a good one.

My main problem with TDP is Kyle Shanahan, who can like you one week and the bench you for no reason. I avoid 49ers.

I’ve heard good things about Chestnut.

Overall, I love your team! They look competitive this year, but also well-loaded for future years. Well done! :+1:

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