Draft Analysis

Last night, Hook and I participated in one of our office’s fantasy football league drafts.  It’s a 12 team league that starts 1 QB, 2 RB, 3WR, 1TE, K, DST.  Passing TD’s are worth 4 points and .5 points are awarded for each reception.

Hook (Hide Yo Kids)  had the 6th pick and I (McNair – Doubtful (Head, Chest)) had the 12th.

Hook’s Self Analysis

I couldn’t ask for this draft to start out better for me.  With the 6th overall pick, I got my man-crush Andre Johnson (WR, HOU).  In a .5 point-per-reception league with 3 starting WR, it is vital to secure a solid receiving corp.  Andre 3000 is the best of the best, in a tier of his own and he’s mine.  All mine.

This season I advised fantasy football enthusiasts to secure at least 2 wide receivers with their top 3 picks.  The running back pool is deep this year with almost the entire league going with a running back by committee approach.  After the big 4 (CJ, AP, MJD and Rice) there are no superstars at RB, but that second tier of running backs is plentiful.  This year there’s 1 great WR, a few very good ones, and then the talent pool gets thin.  Very thin.

In this particular draft, I decided to go WR WR WR.  If this was 3 years ago I’d say such a strategy is a surefire way to tank your draft- but times have changed.  This isn’t the glory days of LT and Priest Holmes scoring 20 TDs and carrying your team to victory week after week.  If you want to win in today’s fantasy football leagues, you need a well-balanced team with as many WR1s on your squad as you can get.  With AJ, Marshall (WR, MIA) and Boldin (WR, BAL) I am sitting pretty and hoping to secure a decent RB with my next pick.

In round 4, I wasn’t expecting a stud, but I was looking for a starting RB with some history of success.  My choice here was between Ronnie Brown (RB, MIA) and Jonathan Stewart (RB, CAR).  Although injury prone, I went with Brown.  I would have been happy with either guy here and only time will tell if I made the right choice.

In the early middle rounds, I was hoping for a few players to fall to me but had no such luck.  Philip Rivers (QB, SD) was picked 3 spots in front of me and Kevin Kolb (QB, PHI) was picked 2 rounds ahead of where I was targeting him.  I watched as CJ Spiller (RB, BUF) and Matt Forte (RB, CHI) disappeared from my queue in succession.  To salvage my draft, I had to change my initial strategy and adapt to the situation at hand.

To round out my roster, I picked a high-end TE in Vernon Davis (TE, SF) and proceeded to draft 3 RBs in a row.  I was the last team to choose a starting QB and I ended up picking 2 in a row in Matt Ryan (QB, ATL) and Carson Palmer (QB, CIN).  This is usually a huge draft no-no, and I’ll be honest I just went with the best player on the board in round 10.  With two serious weapons in Ochocinco and TO, Palmer has some significant upside this year.  I’m going to start with Ryan at the beginning of the season and go with who’s performed the best after week 3.

Round 12 came along and I had drafted all my starters and a few backups.  I broke another one of my draft rules and chose JETS DST.  Usually you’ll see the top DST go off the board by some over-anxious manager in rounds 8-10.  As the PACKERS DST was drafted right before me, I figured it was OK to pull the trigger.  As soon as I did, 3 more defenses flew off the board.  I was happy to get the best one.

Looking at my team, it doesn’t scream “Championship” but I’m confident Hide Yo Kids will be around come playoff time.  The way I’ll get to the ‘ship will be through key free agency pickups and perhaps a trade here or there.  I don’t feel as if I made any major blunders during the draft, which is always a good thing.  I hope you enjoyed this breakdown, and good luck with your teams this fantasy season.

Scott’s Self Analysis

Before the horn sounded to start the draft, I can honestly say that I won the “Best/Most Tasteless Team Name”.  In Fantasy Football, if you’re not going to win the league, you better have the best team name.  McNair – Doubtful (Head, Chest) is probably about as low as I’ve gone with a team name.

When going into a draft, I always want to draft  1,2,3 or 12.  I think they have the best value out of all the picks.  So luckily I landed the 12th pick.  I’m not gonna bore you and analyze every pick to death here.  In this league, WR’s are at a premium.  So on the round 1/2 swing I took WR Miles Austin and WR Roddy White.  With Andre Johnson, Randy Moss and Reggie Wayne off the board already, I was more than happy to land Austin and White.

With all the top-tier RB’s already gone, I felt as if I needed to deviate a little from my plan to go WR, WR, WR and grab one on the round 3/4 swing.  I took RB Arian Foster and then my boy QB Tony Romo.  Romo was the last top-tier QB left,  and to get him in the 4th round, I thought it was a steal.  I don’t have Rivers as a top-tier QB this year simply because he’s missing Vincent Jackson.

Heading towards the round 5/6 swing, I had my sights set on rounding out my WR corps with a real solid #3 WR with #2 potential.  So I had Donald Driver in my queue ready to go and then the guy picking before me snatched him up.  Ugh., oh well.  I turned my attention to grabbing another RB instead, and I’m not happy about it, but I took Knowshon Moreno.  Seriously, who the hell names their kid Knowshon?  This dude has been banged up for 2 years now, but I don’t think I had a choice.  I also took WR Pierre Garcon on the turn.  I think he’s got tremendous upside potential.  Peyton Manning seemed to lock onto this kid down the stretch last year for some long TD’s.

The rest of the way, I was lucky enough to land potential stud Felix Jones, and then tried to hoard some  mediocre RB’s that might pan out.    The RB’s I took were McFadden, Hardesty (blew his knee out 3 hours later), McGahee and Buckhalter.

Overall, I like my squad.  I think I’m real solid at WR and QB.  My RB’s leave a lot to be desired, but there’s always room to make a trade or grab a waiver wire guy.