My league is drafting tonight.
Well, we're approaching the apparent start of the 2020 NFL season. Are folks still doing their usual fantasy leagues this year? Any special changes/rules as a result of COVID and/or the uncertainty? Normally I'm in ~3 leagues, but this year it looks like I'll just be doing one (drafting tonight). Curious to hear what everyone else is doing with the somewhat unusual circumstances this year.
My league is drafting tonight.
Bob Green
Good luck!
I felt great about my first 6 picks or so, then things got a little dicey. I waited on QB hoping to take DJ late but someone snagged him just in front of me (I also wanted to get Crowder to round out my Duke representation but someone nabbed him too). I am not at all comfortable with my QB situation (this is a 12 team league, and a bunch of people took 2 QBs for no apparent reason so QBs are harder to come by). My Flex situation should work itself out in time but it is a total dart throw for week 1.
QB: Ben Roethlisberger (Free Agent, originally drafted Minshew with my final pick in round 16 but dropped him for Big Ben)
WR: DeAndre Hopkins (Round 2, wanted to take an RB but value here was too good to pass up)
WR: DeVante Parker (Round 5)
WR: T.Y. Hilton (Round 6, with Rivers under center I think he is hugely undervalued this year)
RB: Kenyan Drake (Round 1, 10th pick)
RB: David Johnson (Round 4)
TE: Mark Andrews (Round 3)
Flex: Leonard Fournette (Round 7)
Kicker: Matt Prater (Round 14, I think Detroit's offense gets clicking with Stafford back under center)
D/ST: Tennessee Titans (Free agent, originally drafted the Rams in round 15 but dropped them for the Titans)
Bench:
Phillip Lindsay (Round 8)
Deebo Samuel (Round 9)
Jerry Jeudy (Round 10)
Marlon Mack (Round 11)
Robby Anderson (Round 12)
Chase Edmonds (Round 13)
My league drafted last night. I got the third pick, which I executed successfully. I failed on my second pick (screen scroll bar and player names couldn't be seen together) and got handed another RB. Did better the rest of the time, although very sub-optimal -- I took Daniel Jones in the seventh or eighth round and could have scooped him up in the 15th. I refused to take anyone from Dallas because of the inherent moral conflict. Fantasy football's original sin is that you end up rooting against your own team because one of your FF players is on the other team. I'm not ever rooting for Dallas.
One FF player -- I believe one of my brothers -- just sat on the sidelines for most of the draft, probably had a drink or two, let the clock run out, and took "the highest rated player," or whomever was the automatic pick.
Sage Grouse
---------------------------------------
'When I got on the bus for my first road game at Duke, I saw that every player was carrying textbooks or laptops. I coached in the SEC for 25 years, and I had never seen that before, not even once.' - David Cutcliffe to Duke alumni in Washington, DC, June 2013
My league drafts tonight. I usually play in 2 leagues. One isn't going to participate this season and the other has gone from 12 down to 8 teams. I told them I'd participate if they got to the point where they needed 1 more team to make the league viable. They did so I'm playing (feel like I'm just paying $200 to keep the 20 year old league alive in case I feel like playing next year).
Draft is at 8:30. I've done zero homework so far. I'll have about an hour to 90 minutes to create my pre-draft ranking and try to fine an article or two to read and come up with a strategy. Sadly the league added 4 extra starting spots (QB, RB, WR, Flex) and 6 extra roster spots...to me this removes all the advantages and interesting parts of having an 8 team league (good players available on waivers and guys having to make tough decisions on who to start).
Good luck everyone.
Sage Grouse
---------------------------------------
'When I got on the bus for my first road game at Duke, I saw that every player was carrying textbooks or laptops. I coached in the SEC for 25 years, and I had never seen that before, not even once.' - David Cutcliffe to Duke alumni in Washington, DC, June 2013
O see that's what I don't like about 8 team leagues, too many good players on waivers and stacked rosters.
In 8 team leagues I like
Starting 2 qbs, 2 rbs, 2 wrs, and 2 or 3 flex spots plus 1 tight end, 1 defense and no kickers.
Best advice? Don't draft a QB until later and your defense until your last 2 picks. Just keep taking all rbs and wrs and an elite tight end with your first 3 picks. Tight ends get more valuable as league size goes down and qbs become next to irrelevant because its the easiest position to stream. Since its super flex the qbs retain some value but not enough for me to want one until about 10 have gone off the board.
Last edited by JNort; 09-07-2020 at 11:44 AM.
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge" -Stephen Hawking
My league drafted last week. We did it over Zoom which was fun. Much better than the chat function.
RB/ S. Barkley....round 1
RB/ A. Ekeler....round 2
WR/ A. Hopkins...round 3
WR/ O. Beckham..round 4
QB/ P. Mahomes...round 5
RB/...J. Conner....round 6
WR/ TY Hilton....round 7
TE/ Evan Engram..round 8
RB/ Mark Ingram...round 9
WR/ T. Boyd...round 10
QB/ M. Ryan...round 11
TE/ TJ Hockenson...round 12
Def/ Steelers...round 13
LB/ M. Milano..round 14
K/ Justin Tucker.. round 15
Def/ Saints.. round 16
LB/ Z. Cunningham round 17
Waiver wire deals... Dropped Mark Ingram and picked up Antonio Gibson...Dropped Tyler Boyd and picked up Cooper Kupp...Dropped Hockenson and picked up
Jack Doyle...
Pretty pleased with my team.
Thanks JNort. I've played FF for a very long time (like, check the Newspaper and call your opponent Tuesday morning long time) but I can't remember if I've every played an 8 team league. I thought the 1 good thing would be stacked rosters and gold in the waiver wire (which you have to bid $$ to grab) leading to guys having to make real decisions. Most weeks with a 12 team league, there aren't very many decisions: if your good players aren't on a bye, they start. Appreciate the note on the TE's, hadn't thought them that wya.
The league changed the starting lineup as well:
old: 1-QB, 2-RB, 2-WR, 1-TE, 1-Flex (R/W/T), 1-Def, 1-K (15 roster spots)
new: 2-QB, 3-RB, 3-WR, 1-TE, 2-Flex (R/W/T), 1-Def, 1-K (21 roster spots)
One unique thing about this league is that QB's get 1 point per completion and lose a point for an incomplete pass (along with the usual 1pt per 25 yards and 6 points for a TD). We changed the TD's to 4 but a QB in this league can run up some serious points if they are accurate.
I generally leave Defense and Kicker as my last 2 picks. Sometimes I view 1 or 2 defenses as strong and worth an earlier pick but I rarely have acted on that (Defenses seem to be hard to rank properly). In this league if you have 2 strong QB's you would have a pretty big advantage. They both have a good week and you have over 100 points (and could be as many as 140).
It's not unusual for my roster to look like this after 4 rounds: RB, WR, RB, WR (in some order depending on who's there).
I found a tool/app online that said it would import names into Yahoo's pre-draft rankings. So I went to a site, cut and pasted rankings, edited the file so it was just first-name last-name on each line and imported pre-draft rankings for 330 players. Ranking those with Yahoo's interface usually takes forever! I'm pretty fired up now I can spend my pre-draft time reading some strategy notes and making some plans instead of ranking players.
Note, it's a Chrome browser add in that I found last week (PDR) and I don't know if it works on anything other than Yahoo but whoever wrote it deserved a beer (or pie).
Are the DBR pools happening this year? I don't recall who runs that but I would like to participate if they are. Thanks!
My thinking on the Ingram drop and Gibson pick up was that J.K. Dobbins will take some of Ingram's playing time by midseason or even earlier, but I may have dropped the ball here as Dobbins is currently 4th on the RB depth chart. Gibson is 2nd on Washington's RB depth chart behind Peyton Barber. I really don't think Barber is that good of a runner. Gibson is a big fast back that can play WR and return man. I think he will be given the ball for my lowly Washington team(always be the Redskins). As for QBs, we can only play one at a time. My thinking someone will want Ryan in a trade down the road. Our rules are 2-qbs, 4 rbs, 4 wrs, 2 TE, 2 lbs, 2 def teams and
1 kicker. We can play a RB or WR as our flex. I usually end up with playing the match up on defensive team. In an 8 team league, all our teams are pretty equal. The difference will come down to injuries and a surprise player getting hot. Last season I drafted Josh Jacobs(RB) and Darren Waller(TE) and they really came through for me. I hope Gibson does the same for me this season. But I like Barkley, Ekeler and Conner as my RBs. Conner worries me with his injury history though.
My draft results. In the first round, I had to pick between Kamara and M.Thomas. Hope I got that one right but I tend to go RB in those situations. QB may seem early but we score lots of QB points in this league and the pick was situational (looking at who had drafted a QB, who still needed one and who was on the board).
Flying Elvises 1. (4) Alvin Kamara (NO - RB) 2. (13) Davante Adams (GB - WR) 3. (20) Travis Kelce (KC - TE) 4. (29) JuJu Smith-Schuster (Pit - WR) 5. (36) Melvin Gordon III (Den - RB) 6. (45) Drew Brees (NO - QB) 7. (52) Le'Veon Bell (NYJ - RB) 8. (61) Keenan Allen (LAC - WR) 9. (68) Courtland Sutton (Den - WR) 10. (77) Tarik Cohen (Chi - RB) 11. (84) Matthew Stafford (Det - QB) 12. (93) Devin Singletary (Buf - RB) 13. (100) Brandin Cooks (Hou - WR) 14. (109) Rob Gronkowski (TB - TE) 15. (116) Preston Williams (Mia - WR) 16. (125) Kerryon Johnson (Det - RB) 17. (132) Marvin Jones Jr. (Det - WR) 18. (141) Kirk Cousins (Min - QB) 19. (148) Parris Campbell (Ind - WR) 20. (157) Washington (Was - DEF) 21. (164) Younghoe Koo (Atl - K)