Fantasy Football Drafting 101

Player Research

No respectable fantasy owner should walk into their fantasy football draft and select a player who is hurt, or worse yet a player who is retired (don't laugh, I've seen it happen). The research conducted before your fantasy football draft is crucial and will allow you to properly prepare the documentation needed for your draft. Some of the more important subjects to research include:

• Fantasy Player News

  - Which players are in line for a starting gig and which players were involved in strip-club shootings? Spend time checking the news on each player so that you’re well-informed of their status.

• Fantasy Player Movement

  - Which players have changed teams since the previous season? Relate the expected drop/gain in production to that of the new team.

• Recent Retirements

  - Retired players should not be selected draft day.

• Bye Weeks

  - Which teams will be on bye weeks at the same time?

• Team News

  - Which teams bolstered their offense or defense during the offseason? Will that hurt or help the player that you're analyzing?

Documentation

The documentation phase of pre-draft preparation is the culmination of data gleaned during your player research phase. No one can remember every single fact on every fantasy player so you need a way to efficiently document those critical facts that will be useful when you’re on the clock on draft day. The goal is to have all of the necessary information to make an informed draft selection in front of you when your time to select arrives. More than any other piece documentation, the fantasy football cheat sheet is critical to your success on draft day because it condenses all of your data into a comprehensive, but condensed format.

In its simplest form, a fantasy football cheat sheet is nothing more than an organized listing of NFL player rankings for each fantasy position. The idea is that when your turn to pick arrives, you’ll have a crystal-clear picture of the players available at each position and their relative worth to one another. By analyzing your current roster and comparing it against the available players on your cheat sheet, you should be able to make a well-informed selection that you’ll feel comfortable with.

Cheat sheet creation is an art unto itself and fantasy gurus have varying techniques, but information such as player rankings for each position, team information for each player, and bye weeks are absolutely essential. Player rankings are exponentially important, but knowing each player’s team and when their bye week is scheduled will prevent you from unknowingly drafting yourself into a corner as having many players on the same team or having the same bye week can quickly lead to roster-related problems during the fantasy season. Some cheat sheets (such as those offered through this website) go further to include such things as sleeper tags, bust tags, injury tags, and even an integrated area to enter your roster.

What follows is a general list of information that may be worth having handy on draft day, regardless of how you decide to organize it:

• Player Rankings

  - Create an ordered list of players in order of projected fantasy point output.

• Team Information & Bye Weeks

  - Know what team each player plays for and which week their bye falls.

• Supplemental Rankings

  - It is sometimes worthwhile to see where other reputable sources rank each player. Use these supplemental rankings to perform a sanity check against your own rankings.

• Tags

  - Employ simple indicators highlighting fantasy sleepers, fantasy busts, or reminding you of a player’s injury concerns.

• Notes

  - Be sure to jot down any notes on a particular player.

• Roster Area

  - Reserve a place to document your current roster as well as team and bye week information as you make your draft selections.

• Player Cuffs

  - If you draft a stud running back, it is sometimes worthwhile to be aware of his immediate backup so that if the opportunity arises in later rounds you can scoop him up; this way if catastrophe should occur you'll be well prepared.

Last-Minute Preparation

It is always a good idea to do some last-minute fact-checking before your draft gets started. Specifically, it doesn’t hurt to check the NFL’s official site for any last minute injuries that may have occurred. Many fantasy football drafts take place during the NFL pre-season and no player is immune to injury; you want to be sure to adjust your player rankings if any last minute injuries may occur during the exhibition games.

Smart Drafting

The actual fantasy football draft is where all of your research and documentation will pay off. Because you’ve already finalized your cheat sheet, the top player available at each position should be evident throughout the football draft. When your turn to select arrives your most difficult should be deciding which fantasy position to target next; it much easier to choose from the top players at each position than choosing a player from the entire pool of all available players, as most of your fantasy counterparts will be doing. Determining the next position to target will require some careful consideration on its own, but luckily you have all of the necessary information to make an informed decision right in front of you. Some of the factors that will come into play when making your selection include:

• League Configuration

  - Be sure that you fill all necessary positions, but don't violate any roster limits that may be imposed by your commissioner.

• Your Current Roster

  - Fill your skill positions first, but watch for the right time to begin a run on positions not yet targeted.

• Bye Weeks

  - Avoid drafting players at the same position that have the same bye week, otherwise you could have trouble finding viable replacements when those players are on a bye.

• Teams

  - Avoid drafting many players that are on the same team. There are only so many points that one team can score each week, so it’s a good idea to draft players that span a wide range of teams.

• Tier-based Rankings

  - Although it is outside the scope of this article, it is a good idea to rank your players by tiers; this manner of classification helps you evaluate the relative worth of players across different fantasy positions by comparing the tiers in which they reside.