Heading into a fantasy football draft, most owners have at least a basic strategy for how they will approach the first few rounds. If you know your draft pick number beforehand, usually you have some idea of who will be
Heading into a fantasy football draft, most owners have at least a basic strategy for how they will approach the first few rounds. If you know your draft pick number beforehand, usually you have some idea of who will be available and who you are hoping to snag.
My personal approach has usually been to come out of the first three rounds with at least two running backs. Running backs win leagues and are the backbone of every good fantasy squad. Waiting to take your first running back until the third or fourth round will usually leave you shorthanded and desperate to make a trade a few weeks into the season.
However, this may be the year to buck the trend, depending on where you pick.
If you’re in the top 5-6 picks of the first round, I’d still recommend going running back first, unless your league’s scoring system is really funky and QBs or WRs are much more valuable than the average league. If I can get Adrian Peterson, Maurice Jones-Drew, Matt Forte, Michael Turner or LaDainian Tomlinson in the first round, I won’t think of passing them up.
But if you’re sitting around the eighth or ninth pick, it might be worth it to grab one or two elite WRs and try to go for broke with some sleeper running backs in the middle rounds.
Let’s say you can get Andre Johnson and Randy Moss in the first two rounds. Your wide receiver decisions are done and you can load up on running backs that have fallen in many mock drafts. Larry Johnson is being taken in the fifth-sixth round. For a former top fantasy player who is perfectly healthy and doesn’t have much competition for carries, that’s a steal.
Ravens second-year runner Ray Rice is starting to get some buzz because he’s been working with the first team throughout the preseason, but he’s still being taken around the seventh round.
Rookies Donald Brown (Colts) and Shonn Greene (Jets) have been very impressive and seem to be on teams with running backs who aren’t capable of holding the starting job.
Another guy sinking like a stone has been Buffalo’s Marshawn Lynch. He’s a first or second-round talent, but he’ll miss the first three weeks to serve a league suspension following an arrest for gun possession. However, 13 games is still a good chunk of the season. If he’s around in the fourth or fifth round, he shouldn’t be.
So, what if you come away from the first seven rounds of your draft with Andre Johnson, Moss, a third-round running back like Ryan Grant, a QB in the fourth like Aaron Rodgers or Phillip Rivers, then go for broke with Larry Johnson, Rice and Brown?
That’s four potential starting running backs, a top-5 QB and maybe the two best WRs in fantasy football.
Of course, it is a risk. If you get the two great receivers but all your sleeper running backs get snagged before they get to you, your whole strategy becomes moot. You’ll be praying that guys like Earnest Graham, Reggie Bush and whoever the Patriots decide should run the ball that particular week can keep your team afloat.
Going running back in the first two rounds is never a bad thing, as long as you still find good value in the middle rounds. However, if no elite running backs are on the board when you select, the best way to keep your team from middle-of-the-pack status might be to pull a George Costanza and simply do the opposite.
