Shark or Stupid? Zero RB Draft Strategy (1 Viewer)

[Noah Davis]

I liked fantasy a lot more before the nerds started playing.

IBT "OMG you must suck and hate losing then if you are complaining" post

There was no fantasy before the nerds started playing. Who do you think sat around and thought "man, football is great, but I think I'd like it a lot more if two days later I could meticulously tabulate all of the statistics of a predetermined set of players by hand and compare those directly against the statistics of another predetermined set of players assembled by someone else to determine which of us was better able to predict player performances"?

It's gone mainstream over the last decade, but I distinctly remember a time when there were few things you could say that were considered nerdier than "I play fantasy football". It was just a step above D&D in terms of social acceptability. It was like playing video games after your 18th birthday before the rise of Call of Duty and Halo and video game "Bro Culture".

Nominated for best post of the year.

 

[LOCO]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

 

[JFS171]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

That sounds like a logical fallacy to me. It's not the depth of WR, it's the relative performance of those WRs.

If WRs in the first and second round outscore their counterparts in the 5-7th rounds by X, and the RBs you take in those early rounds only outscore their later counterparts by Y, and X>Y, then you're screwed. Doesn't matter how good the WRs are in the 5th-7th rounds.

That's also completely ignoring risk, which is significantly less with WR/TE than with RB.

 

[Noah Davis]

1. Peterson, Adrian MIN RB 1.77 1 231 81412. Martin, Doug TBB RB 4.29 1 286 81523. Foster, Arian HOU RB 5.56 1 234 81894. Charles, Jamaal KCC RB 7.32 1 496 82025. Rice, Ray BAL RB 8.72 1 501 82006. Spiller, C.J. BUF RB 8.94 1 246 81747. Lynch, Marshawn SEA RB 9.95 1 186 81828. Richardson, IND RB 10.06 1 244 81939. McCoy, LeSean PHI RB 10.32 1 513 822210. Morris, Alfred WAS RB 16.09 1 260 818411. Forte, Matt CHI RB 16.69 1 549 825012. Johnson, Chris TEN RB 22.64 1 477 826513. Jackson, Steven ATL RB 23.39 1 585 826714. Jones-Drew, JAC RB 28.19 1 261 827815. Bush, Reggie DET RB 28.50 1 676 827816. Ridley, Stevan NEP RB 31.37 1 460 825717. Murray, DeMarco DAL RB 36.31 2 712 825518. Wilson, David NYG RB 36.98 1 657 825419. Gore, Frank SFO RB 37.28 1 532 827120. Sproles, Darren NOS RB 38.43 2 281 828221. McFadden, Darren OAK RB 43.14 3 299 826422. Miller, Lamar MIA RB 49.38 1 332 831423. Lacy, Eddie GBP RB 53.17 1 604 831624. Mathews, Ryan SDC RB 61.57 2 400 824525. Ball, Montee DEN RB 63.55 1 996 828226. Bernard, Giovani CIN RB 67.59 1 1080 823027. Bell, Le'Veon PIT RB 78.77 1 569 799428. Bradshaw, Ahmad IND RB 80.62 7 555 814529. Ivory, Chris NYJ RB 80.65 6 621 812530. Richardson, STL RB 81.36 3 693 812831. Vereen, Shane NEP RB 82.56 5 439 800132. Mendenhall, ARI RB 85.81 3 949 8095This is only 2013 so I don't know how it compares to previous years but there were 5 big busts in the top 8 RB's last year and some good values in the 5th round and later.

Guys like Moreno, Woodhead, Joique Bell, PT, Stacy and Fred Jackson weren't drafted until late so it does appear that if you gamble on the right RB's late (or take a shotgun approach) you can be successful with this strategy.

Isn't this basically what Bloom always says....any strategy can work as long as you pick the right guys. Peyton Manning in the 1st or Jay Cutler in the 9th can be a championship team as long as you pick the right guys.

 

[Noah Davis]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

That sounds like a logical fallacy to me. It's not the depth of WR, it's the relative performance of those WRs.

If WRs in the first and second round outscore their counterparts in the 5-7th rounds by X, and the RBs you take in those early rounds only outscore their later counterparts by Y, and X>Y, then you're screwed. Doesn't matter how good the WRs are in the 5th-7th rounds.

That's also completely ignoring risk, which is significantly less with WR/TE than with RB.

There is always an Alshon Jeffery or Josh Gordon in the late rounds, as well as a Knowshon Moreno or Zac Stacey - it's about picking the right guys in the middle rounds and being able to identify ascending players with your WW $$.

 

[Freelove]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

That sounds like a logical fallacy to me. It's not the depth of WR, it's the relative performance of those WRs.

If WRs in the first and second round outscore their counterparts in the 5-7th rounds by X, and the RBs you take in those early rounds only outscore their later counterparts by Y, and X>Y, then you're screwed. Doesn't matter how good the WRs are in the 5th-7th rounds.

That's also completely ignoring risk, which is significantly less with WR/TE than with RB.

That's only because you're interpreting "deep" in the most general and useless sense imaginable, here.

He's not saying "there are still WR's available." Because in that sense, every position is deep. When the draft is over, WR, RB, and QB are all still "deep." Hooray for Bilal Powell and Ace Sanders!

When someone in a FF discussion says a position is deep this year, they mean precisely that there are still players left at such-and-such a round that they perceive to still have pretty high value relative to the guys they could have gotten earlier. With the corresponding thought most likely being that in the other, more shallow positions, he perceives that the players left are of pretty low value, relative to those available earlier. He may be wrong in his evaluation (though I agree with it), but he's not botching his logic in saying it.

I think going RB heavy and early this year gives you the best chance of getting the most valuable overall team, coupled with the greatest safety of your analysis being correct. Doesn't mean there won't be studs who emerge in later rounds at every position -- just that in my opinion, the uncertainty behind the breakout RB candidates available later on make them an unnecessarily shaky bedrock to build your team upon.

 

[Ilov80s]

Any predetermined strategy like this is dumb. I think you always need to look at BPA (except for the ridiculous like taking 2 QBs early). Why let a great RB value slip by just because you are deadset on taking a WR? This is how guys slip in the draft ever year. People get in their head: I'm going RB-WR or I'm going WR-WR. Next thing you know, someone gets Montee Ball in the late 2nd and those same people are wondering, "geez what a great pick, can't believe he fell."

It all depends on the roster requirements and scoring of the league. If it isn't mandatory to start 2 RB's every week, then RB value isn't that great, especially in PPR leagues. The value is with those "traditionalist" fantasy players who have the mindset that they are going RB/RB in the first two rounds no matter what, and leave real value on the board. When the point value of a RB like Demarco Murray or Marshawn Lynch is equivalent to a Michael Floyd or Cordarrelle Patterson, why should an owner reach in the 1st or 2nd round for them?

They shouldn't, that's the whole point of my post. People often draft with a mentality that limits them and prevents them from getting the best values whether that be a RB, WR or even a QB.

The value of Murray vs someone like Floyd is not even close. Murray was #4 rb in ppg among PPR rb's last year. 1 pt behind forte and only 1.8 behind McCoy. Floyd wasn't even top 25 among wr in ppg. When is a high end wr3 comparable to a rb1? This "zero rb" thing is starting to get crazy based off 1 year of higher than average rb busts.I feel most are gravitating to wr early because they feel "safer" and more predictable. However, rb's who get majority of team carries and also catch passes will always be the most valuable and consistent because they are rare. Lots of good wr's left in round 4 and 5 when all the rb's are gambles at that point.

I assumed he was talking about his projections for this year. I'm not advocating any particular player over another and there's a million different scoring rules and lineup requirements that alter things. My point is just that preset strategies are bad whether they are traditional or "the hot new thing". Like someone else posted, you have to be water and take the shape of the draft instead of trying to force the draft into some plan you made up in your head.

 

[FF Ninja]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

This is my thought. You can wait on WR and just grab Andre Johnson, Mike Wallace, and Eric Decker and laugh at all the people trying to follow the zero RB trend.

My draft strategy changes every year depending on which players I'm targeting as my value plays. Last year I planned my draft around getting Mathews as my RB2 in the 5th round. This year I'm planning on getting my WR2 and WR3 in the 5th/6th.

 

[bicycle_seat_sniffer]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

This is my thought. You can wait on WR and just grab Andre Johnson, Mike Wallace, and Eric Decker and laugh at all the people trying to follow the zero RB trend.

My draft strategy changes every year depending on which players I'm targeting as my value plays. Last year I planned my draft around getting Mathews as my RB2 in the 5th round. This year I'm planning on getting my WR2 and WR3 in the 5th/6th.

wallace & decker? no thanks

 

[ZWK]

Be water my friend. I don't like going into drafts with a set plan. But this is certainly another tool to have in your draft repertioire.

Agreed, play it as it lies. Take the value as it falls.

In one best ball league this year I took zero RBs in the first 5 rounds, in another I started off RB-RB. In the second round of a PPR draft, if I'm choosing between a RB like Foster or Lynch and a WR like Marshall then I'll take the WR; if Garcon is the best WR available then I'll probably take Foster or Lynch.

At some point you have to fill out every position in your lineup, but (especially in best ball) you can do that in the mid rounds by throwing numbers at it if the value is elsewhere early on.

 

[Concept Coop]

Be water my friend. I don't like going into drafts with a set plan. But this is certainly another tool to have in your draft repertioire.

Agreed, play it as it lies. Take the value as it falls.

Yup. If there was a secret formula, it would be very clear to the hobby by now.

 

[Adam Harstad]

Be water my friend. I don't like going into drafts with a set plan. But this is certainly another tool to have in your draft repertioire.

Agreed, play it as it lies. Take the value as it falls.

Yup. If there was a secret formula, it would be very clear to the hobby by now.

It *IS* very clear to the hobby by now. The secret formula is to hit on your early picks and then not miss on your mid-to-late picks.

 

[Concept Coop]

Win your league in two easy steps:

1. Make playoffs

2. Don't lose playoff games

 

[Ilov80s]

Be water my friend. I don't like going into drafts with a set plan. But this is certainly another tool to have in your draft repertioire.

Agreed, play it as it lies. Take the value as it falls.

Yup. If there was a secret formula, it would be very clear to the hobby by now.

It *IS* very clear to the hobby by now. The secret formula is to hit on your early picks and then not miss on your mid-to-late picks.

And to add a couple great WW pickups.

 

[Rhythmdoctor]

Win your league in two easy steps:

1. Make playoffs

2. Don't lose playoff games

I laughed.

 

[Ilov80s]

Win your league in two easy steps:

1. Make playoffs

2. Don't lose playoff games

It's the old Steve Martin how to be a millionaire and never pay taxes.

 

[cvnpoka]

The new shark move or just reactionary stupidity?

The Zero RB theory is the brainchild of Shawn Siegele, who suggests steering clear of running backs until the fifth or sixth round of a draft.

Zero RB is basically what it sounds like. You simply don’t draft running backs in the high leverage rounds. Depending on how a draft is progressing, I will draft either one high upside running back in Round 4 or 5, or I will draft none at all. My preferred lineup after five rounds is to own one tight end (Graham/Gronk) and four wide receivers. I then focus on selecting potential breakout players, the receiving back in timeshares, and backups in good offenses.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fancy-stats/wp/2014/08/15/waiting-to-pick-running-backs-in-your-fantasy-football-draft-is-not-as-crazy-as-it-sounds/

Zero RB has been gaining a lot of attention, but it sounds like shots are about to be fired:

About halfway through my/our "Zero RB Is Dumb And You Should Feel Dumb" article. Get ready for math, behavioral economics and strong words..
-@Numberfire

I don't think Numberfire's rebuttal has posted yet, so I'll offer my own in the meantime. I read the original article when Sean wrote it. It was very well-written and entertaining, though as has been pointed out, it was hardly his "brainchild" (note: Sean never claimed it was, that came from the author of the Washington Post article who was obviously unaware of previous writing on the strategy by Waldman and many, many others.)

As much as I enjoyed it, here's a brief point-by-point rebuttal:

Claim 1: VBD doesn't work

- This one is pretty laughable. As Siegele admits, it's the dominant strategy used by expert drafters, and has been for over a decade. If it didn't work don't you think... umm... someone would have noticed by now?

Claim 2: Most people generate poor VBD baselines

- This goes hand-in-hand with claim 1, but completely undermines it. The problem isn't that VBD doesn't work, it's that people are doing it wrong. If I did Prancercise for 20 hours a week and then complained that I wasn't getting ripped, you wouldn't say "exercise doesn't work", you'd say "you exercise wrong".

Claim 3: VBD lineups are "overwhelmingly fragile in the face of prediction errors"

- I can complain about projections like the best of them (I don't use them, personally), but all drafting methods are fragile in the face of bad predictions. VBD introduces two possible points of error (in the player projection and in the baseline projection), but it's a necessary evil because without the baseline projection there's no rigorous way to compare positions. Saying you shouldn't project baselines because it introduces more fragility is like saying you shouldn't predict player performance because it introduces more fragility. It's notable that all of the top experts in FantasyPros' expert accuracy rankings use specific projections. It's certainly not the only way to go, but it's clearly got a pretty good track record.

Claim 4: VBD lineups tend to be fairly balanced

This is just a flat-out misunderstanding of VBD. I've had drafts where pure VBD was telling me that I should be drafting an RB in each of the first 8 rounds, and I had to actually overrule that VBD suggestion and go off script. VBD is agnostic to your lineup so far; if VBD drafters tend to have a balanced roster, it's either because that's where the value was, or else it's because they ignored VBD.

Claim 5: It makes sense to ignore RBs because they get hurt at a substantially higher rate than other positions

This data may be 13 years old, but until I see something more recent to the contrary, I'll assume it still holds. Drinen found that the average RB played about 13 games a year, the average WR played about 14 games a year, and the average QB played about 12.5 games a year, (that QB number definitely seems like it's been increased due to rule changes, though I haven't run any numbers on it.) Now, RB has an advantage in that workload tends to be transferred a bit more cleanly in the face of injuries (it's rare to see one WR take a huge majority of another WR's targets when that WR gets injured), so you can't just go and grab backup WRs when a starting WR goes down (although: Harry Douglas). The mechanics are different, but the injury rates are largely the same.

To be fair, again, I think the article was entertaining and well-written, and I think the strategy is totally valid (even if I disagree with his reasons for using it). Last year was clearly a season where "Zero RB" probably would have been the way to go, because there was so much chaos at the top of the RB rankings. Of course, the article was written in November after that was already obvious. Had all the RBs stayed healthy and productive, I wonder if we might have gotten a call-out to the article he'd written earlier about drafting RB-RB-RB, instead. It's a lot easier to identify the proper strategy with the full benefit of hindsight. I'm not picking on Sean or accusing him of some nefarious intent- I think the guy's awesome, I read most everything he writes, and his fantasy football success pretty much speaks for itself. I think he has every reason in the world to be confident. I just think his writing tends to overstate that confidence. It tends to be too black-and-white when the reality of fantasy football is expressed more in shades of gray.

One thing I do think he got exactly right is the perils of going with a balanced lineup in the draft (though, again, this is not a flaw with VBD drafting). People underestimate bust rates and assume the guys they pick in the first 7 rounds are "starters" and the guys after that are "backups", when in reality they should be assuming that half of their picks are going to bust, (meaning you're still drafting "starters" deep into the teens).

could you elaborate on that? what are the perils of a balanced lineup?

 

[cvnpoka]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

i disagree. lets look at my last ppr draft

rb:

5: morris, rice, cj, stacy mathews

6: gore, pierre, woodhead

7 :sankey, richardson, lamar

8: mjd, ridley, fjax

wr:

5: crabtree, wright

6: djax, welker, wayne, wallace, hilton, maclin

7: sanders, edelman, torrey, decker, watkins, hopkins, twill, shorts

8: cooks, kelvin

 

[cvnpoka]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

This is my thought. You can wait on WR and just grab Andre Johnson, Mike Wallace, and Eric Decker and laugh at all the people trying to follow the zero RB trend.

My draft strategy changes every year depending on which players I'm targeting as my value plays. Last year I planned my draft around getting Mathews as my RB2 in the 5th round. This year I'm planning on getting my WR2 and WR3 in the 5th/6th.

mathews is still going in the 5th very often. his adp is late 4th. and id much prefer to trot him out than decker or wallace.

 

[Freelove]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

This is my thought. You can wait on WR and just grab Andre Johnson, Mike Wallace, and Eric Decker and laugh at all the people trying to follow the zero RB trend.

My draft strategy changes every year depending on which players I'm targeting as my value plays. Last year I planned my draft around getting Mathews as my RB2 in the 5th round. This year I'm planning on getting my WR2 and WR3 in the 5th/6th.

mathews is still going in the 5th very often. his adp is late 4th. and id much prefer to trot him out than decker or wallace.

I think most people would, but the previous poster's odd assertion notwithstanding, I don't see anyplace where those are the receivers going in that range. If you want, you can do a lot better with 4th and 5th round picks in place of Mathews, if that's where you're taking your wideouts.

 

[NE_REVIVAL]

I understand the hate for anything that might challenge the sacred "vbd" theory.

I don't understand how you can argue with the success SS had using it last year, or the fact that the NFL seems to be moving in the same direction.

As for the "well you never hear about the 11 out of 12 times zero rb doesn't work out" crowd; do you hear much about the 11 out of 12 vbd theorists that don't succeed?

As many have pointed out, no matter what strategy you choose, you have to be mostly right about the players u select in order to succeed..

I think Zero rb has some advantages and i'm giving it a try this year; I will check in a few months from now and let u know how it's going

 

[LOCO]

lets mock from the 5th hole. 12 team, 2 rb, 2 wr, flex

calvin

brown

J. thomas

crabtree

tate

ridley

vs.

lacy

ellington

doug martin

crabtree

harvin

rudolph

team b just looks better to me.

 

[hotboyz]

lets mock from the 5th hole. 12 team, 2 rb, 2 wr, flex

calvin

brown

J. thomas

crabtree

tate

ridley

vs.

lacy

ellington

doug martin

crabtree

harvin

rudolph

team b just looks better to me.

Now take team A make that Calvin Gronk Allen Tate joique doesn't that look better

 

[rocketsauce]

lets mock from the 5th hole. 12 team, 2 rb, 2 wr, flex

calvin

brown

J. thomas

crabtree

tate

ridley

vs.

lacy

ellington

doug martin

crabtree

harvin

rudolph

team b just looks better to me.

If we're talking PPR (which I think is the main place to employ this strategy) I'd take team A every day. And that's even with you taking Crabtree, who I don't like

 

[cvnpoka]

ridleys adp is 85. tates is 63. so you can grab those guys in the 7th and 8th. how about in 5th and 6th getting gerhart, morris, gore, pierre, sankey, mathews, joique. now your have a huge advantage at wr, a strong te, and a ton or rb depth.

 

[LOCO]

ridleys adp is 85. tates is 63. so you can grab those guys in the 7th and 8th. how about in 5th and 6th getting gerhart, morris, gore, pierre, sankey, mathews, joique. now your have a huge advantage at wr, a strong te, and a ton or rb depth.

those guys are always gone in the 4th and 5th.

 

[GroveDiesel]

http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/11097919/running-backs-lesean-mccoy-go-early-fantasy-drafts-espn-magazine

 

[Adam Harstad]

could you elaborate on that? what are the perils of a balanced lineup?

It's not that there are perils to balanced lineups per se, it's that there's perils in passing up value to chase a balanced lineup. A lot of times owners will say "wow, this RB is the best player on the board right now, but I already have two RBs and only one WR, so I'm going to draft an inferior fantasy asset at WR just to balance out my starting lineup". The problem with this, of course, is that busts are so rampant that the odds are pretty good that owner would have counted on that 3rd RB to be a starter, anyway, so he just passed on a superior fantasy asset to draft an inferior fantasy asset.

 

[Adam Harstad]

I understand the hate for anything that might challenge the sacred "vbd" theory.

I don't understand how you can argue with the success SS had using it last year, or the fact that the NFL seems to be moving in the same direction.

As for the "well you never hear about the 11 out of 12 times zero rb doesn't work out" crowd; do you hear much about the 11 out of 12 vbd theorists that don't succeed?

As many have pointed out, no matter what strategy you choose, you have to be mostly right about the players u select in order to succeed..

I think Zero rb has some advantages and i'm giving it a try this year; I will check in a few months from now and let u know how it's going

Sean Siegele had some success with Zero RB. He also had some success with RB-RB-RB. His biggest winning team took Jamaal Charles in the 1st. I'm not aware of any major money-winning teams that were zero-RB squads, but I don't exactly follow all of his different leagues to track his successes. Siegele has like 50 teams a year, and he uses a whole variety of strategies, which should be the biggest tip-off to the fact that none of these strategies are "dominant strategies" (or else he wouldn't be using so many different approaches).

The real takeaway from his article should be "take the best fantasy players, and if they all happen to be at the same position, don't freak out about that."

 

[rocketsauce]

ridleys adp is 85. tates is 63. so you can grab those guys in the 7th and 8th. how about in 5th and 6th getting gerhart, morris, gore, pierre, sankey, mathews, joique. now your have a huge advantage at wr, a strong te, and a ton or rb depth.

those guys are always gone in the 4th and 5th.

This seems silly to even respond to, but...no, no they're not.

Current ADP on MFL (12 team PPR) puts the following in the

4th: Bush, Spiller,

5th: Vereen, Mathews, Gerhart, Sankey, Jennings, Rice

6th: Tate, T-Rich, CJ, Gore, Joique,

Ridley is a late 8th round pick according to their current ADP on MFL.

 

[Courtweeks87]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

i disagree. lets look at my last ppr draft

rb:

5: morris, rice, cj, stacy mathews

6: gore, pierre, woodhead

7 :sankey, richardson, lamar

8: mjd, ridley, fjax

wr:

5: crabtree, wright

6: djax, welker, wayne, wallace, hilton, maclin

7: sanders, edelman, torrey, decker, watkins, hopkins, twill, shorts

8: cooks, kelvin

Morris or Stacy in the 5th? Sankey in the 7th? Not in any drafts I've been in has that happened. Not even close. in ppr I would take any of those wrs in the 6th or 7th round over all those rbs in the 6th and 7th

 

[Ilov80s]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

i disagree. lets look at my last ppr draft

rb:

5: morris, rice, cj, stacy mathews

6: gore, pierre, woodhead

7 :sankey, richardson, lamar

8: mjd, ridley, fjax

wr:

5: crabtree, wright

6: djax, welker, wayne, wallace, hilton, maclin

7: sanders, edelman, torrey, decker, watkins, hopkins, twill, shorts

8: cooks, kelvin

Morris or Stacy in the 5th? Sankey in the 7th? Not in any drafts I've been in has that happened. Not even close. in ppr I would take any of those wrs in the 6th or 7th round over all those rbs in the 6th and 7th

Not in a 12 team league with a common lineup.

 

[FreeBaGeL]

this is not the year to do this. WR is DEEP, DEEP. the WR in the 5th-7th rounds are MUCH BETTER than the RBs.

i disagree. lets look at my last ppr draft

rb:

5: morris, rice, cj, stacy mathews

6: gore, pierre, woodhead

7 :sankey, richardson, lamar

8: mjd, ridley, fjax

wr:

5: crabtree, wright

6: djax, welker, wayne, wallace, hilton, maclin

7: sanders, edelman, torrey, decker, watkins, hopkins, twill, shorts

8: cooks, kelvin

Morris or Stacy in the 5th? Sankey in the 7th? Not in any drafts I've been in has that happened. Not even close. in ppr I would take any of those wrs in the 6th or 7th round over all those rbs in the 6th and 7th

Agreed, ADP of Sankey has him in the 5th, with Morris and Stacy in the 3rd.

 

[thriftyrocker]

The real takeaway from his article should be "take the best fantasy players, and if they all happen to be at the same position, don't freak out about that."

In both the 3RB and 0RB strategies there are reasons for making a run on the targeted positions, "resiliency" vs. "antifragility," strategies to address risk. If you want to ignore the controversial aspect of the article (don't take RB until Rd5, or VBD is dead long live VBD), the takeaway is to consider how your lineup can improve over the season when random events occur. Taking Knile Davis, Latavius Murray, or Ronnie Hillman late (quoting another of his articles) is an obvious recommendation to make (but a bit of a fallacy because the back end of redraft rosters are often too fluid for them to stick long enough to matter). There are antifragile players at other positions too, guys with great upside if thrust into large roles (Ladarius Green, Hopkins, Justin Hunter, Stills, Jordan Matthews, Greg Jennings, ummm Josh Gordon, okay maybe not that last one, or to look deeper Quick, Da'Rick). You could say Julian Edelman, Kendall Wright, and Keenan Allen were all great "0RB" picks last year, as making those picks involved successfully evaluating both the player's competency and the opportunity available in the NFL team's offense and depth chart.

 

[Ilov80s]

The real takeaway from his article should be "take the best fantasy players, and if they all happen to be at the same position, don't freak out about that."

In both the 3RB and 0RB strategies there are reasons for making a run on the targeted positions, "resiliency" vs. "antifragility," strategies to address risk. If you want to ignore the controversial aspect of the article (don't take RB until Rd5, or VBD is dead long live VBD), the takeaway is to consider how your lineup can improve over the season when random events occur. Taking Knile Davis, Latavius Murray, or Ronnie Hillman late (quoting another of his articles) is an obvious recommendation to make (but a bit of a fallacy because the back end of redraft rosters are often too fluid for them to stick long enough to matter). There are antifragile players at other positions too, guys with great upside if thrust into large roles (Ladarius Green, Hopkins, Justin Hunter, Stills, Jordan Matthews, Greg Jennings, ummm Josh Gordon, okay maybe not that last one, or to look deeper Quick, Da'Rick). You could say Julian Edelman, Kendall Wright, and Keenan Allen were all great "0RB" picks last year, as making those picks involved successfully evaluating both the player's competency and the opportunity available in the NFL team's offense and depth chart.

Right, a lot of any strategy relies on the belief that you have identified late round players that will greatly outperform their ADP.

 

[cvnpoka]

ridleys adp is 85. tates is 63. so you can grab those guys in the 7th and 8th. how about in 5th and 6th getting gerhart, morris, gore, pierre, sankey, mathews, joique. now your have a huge advantage at wr, a strong te, and a ton or rb depth.

those guys are always gone in the 4th and 5th.

This seems silly to even respond to, but...no, no they're not.

Current ADP on MFL (12 team PPR) puts the following in the

4th: Bush, Spiller,

5th: Vereen, Mathews, Gerhart, Sankey, Jennings, Rice

6th: Tate, T-Rich, CJ, Gore, Joique,

Ridley is a late 8th round pick according to their current ADP on MFL.

ya its a patently ridiculous statement. heres fbg consensus adps, followed by the published mid august ffpc adps, and then the 4 ffpc drafts (in historical order) ive done:

ben tate: 63 74 74 77 36 77

ridley: 85 94 103 79 93 107

gerhart: 44 49 43 51 47 51

morris: 30 42 56 53 49 57

gore: 61 71 77 62 61 68

pierre: 75 66 68 81 62 70

sankey: 54 59 62 52 75 71

mathews: 45 56 57 63 60 61

joique: 56 44 51 52 34 43

for some reason those mfl drafts have a lot of these guys going even lower.

 

[renesauz]

Different circumstance but our league went to: 1QB, 5 Flex, K, D.

So you can start up to 5WR, 3WR/2TE, 2RB/2WR/1TE....etc.

It definitely changes the draft strategy and I sure pushes the value of RB down quite a bit.

One thing I'm finding in leagues like this though is that trading becomes far more stagnant as it becomes almost too easy to field a lineup and there's no pressure whatsoever to maintain any real positional balance on your squad.

 

[renesauz]

The real takeaway from his article should be "take the best fantasy players, and if they all happen to be at the same position, don't freak out about that."

 

[rocketsauce]

Different circumstance but our league went to: 1QB, 5 Flex, K, D.

So you can start up to 5WR, 3WR/2TE, 2RB/2WR/1TE....etc.

It definitely changes the draft strategy and I sure pushes the value of RB down quite a bit.

One thing I'm finding in leagues like this though is that trading becomes far more stagnant as it becomes almost too easy to field a lineup and there's no pressure whatsoever to maintain any real positional balance on your squad.

Yup, I tried a bit of a test league last year. I called it MEGAFLEX. 2 QBs, 10 Flex, 1 K, 1 DST. Basically start whatever the hell you want. Trading was practically non existent (a few QB trades) due to the lack of positional requirements each week. It was definitely a failure of a test run, in my book.

 

[John 14:6]

Different circumstance but our league went to: 1QB, 5 Flex, K, D.

So you can start up to 5WR, 3WR/2TE, 2RB/2WR/1TE....etc.

It definitely changes the draft strategy and I sure pushes the value of RB down quite a bit.

One thing I'm finding in leagues like this though is that trading becomes far more stagnant as it becomes almost too easy to field a lineup and there's no pressure whatsoever to maintain any real positional balance on your squad.

Yup, I tried a bit of a test league last year. I called it MEGAFLEX. 2 QBs, 10 Flex, 1 K, 1 DST. Basically start whatever the hell you want. Trading was practically non existent (a few QB trades) due to the lack of positional requirements each week. It was definitely a failure of a test run, in my book.

Yeah, I played fantasy Nascar a couple years. It made me realize that the funnest part of fantasy football is building a team and shoring up the different positions...

 

[rockaction]

I think, in the wake of Javonte, Akers, Dobbins that this is a ripe topic of discussion for the modern iteration of the SP.

In my own opinion, the value part of the argument discussed here is correct for redraft, but what about for dynasty?

I know that some peoples' answer to taking the best player in the draft, so you take the best player in the draft. Draft for talent, trade for need. But what if you have a league where there aren't many trades, or it's tough to make a deal? And what about the injury market, which is probably the market most difficult to exploit efficiency with?

I wonder about that.

I'm personally beginning to realize that draft capital with early picks is better spent on wide receivers in dynasty. RBs still win leagues, though. You just have to be lucky or patient.

And to muse further, I've noticed that winning in dynasty is a whole lot of luck or is the result of being so dominant and on top of things that you dwarf the rest of your league mates. Our champ two years ago is now dead last in our league. He had a team, going into last year, that not many people thought could be beat, but he's RB heavy. It's a quick fall from grace if you are RB heavy, it seems.

Zero RB strategy to the front, please. Zero RB report.

 

[candian fantasy guy]

I drafted the majority of my teams with an eye on getting up side RB’s in rounds 7/8+ in the draft. I try to do the hero RB thing as much as possible but I won’t force a pick. If a WR or TE is higher on my list, so be it, he’s on my team.

This year, I ended up with many later round picks, so I have healthy amount of Joe Mixon on my teams, to go along with a Diggs, Andrews and Adams. The. The 3/4 turn would come around and I went WR/WR(I have lots of Sutton)most of the time. Although I have few Zeke picks in the 4th.

I feel like the top WR are a little more consistent and therefore more valuable in the first 60 picks or so.

In auctions, I target top 20 WR’s, I try to get up to 4. Cheating out on RB’s most of the time. Getting a collection of guys like Sanders, CEH, J-Rob, etc… if you hit on these RB’s, you are likely a front runner in the league and in for a fun season.

 

[eighsse2]

The new shark move or just reactionary stupidity?

They're not the same? **** I've been doing it wrong