"What!?"
"Why on earth did you draft Terrell Pryor in the 6th round?" I exclaimed.
It was the middle of a fantasy football draft at work in 2016, and someone had just drafted Terrell Pryor way too early. His ADP back in 2016 was in the 14th round.
"He's going to have a great year! He's a stud!" said the guy who happened to be an OSU graduate.
Now, to his credit, Pryor ended up with 77 receptions and over 1,000 yards that season. However, that would be great production from a late-round sleeper, not necessarily a mid-round draft pick. No one else would have drafted Pryor for at least several rounds, so he should have waited longer to make the pick.
Pryor ended up being a great fantasy player, but it was not a good fantasy draft pick in the 6th round.
What are the best fantasy football picks?
The story above helps show that even good players can be bad draft picks, and sometimes vice versa.
Mediocre players with a lot of opportunities and touches can sometimes be great fantasy producers. Also, big well-known quarterbacks are usually not good fantasy football draft picks until mid-rounds or later rounds.
The key factor in fantasy football drafts is opportunity cost. If you pick one player now, who else could you have drafted in their place?
One way to calculate that is with Value Based Drafting. You can use the fantasy points that the player is expected to score in comparison to a baseline player for that position. That determines their VBD score. Then, if you rank players by their VBD score you will calculate who the best fantasy football picks are.
Using that calculation, you will see the top 200 best fantasy football picks here for each scoring format:
- Best fantasy football picks for PPR leagues
- Best fantasy football picks for Half-PPR leagues
- Best fantasy football picks for Non-PPR leagues
- Best fantasy football picks for 2-Quarterback leagues
Conclusion
To make the best draft picks for fantasy football, you have to consider opportunity cost, as calculated by the Value Based Drafting (VBD) method.
Fantasy rankings are constantly in flux based on news and injuries, so be sure to check the links above for the most up-to-date data on fantasy football rankings.
Good luck with your draft!
