I recently wrapped up a slow draft in Underdog Fantasy's $500 contest—The Big Dog—which has a $200,000 top prize.

This tournament is much smaller than many of the other contests on the site with only 2,160 total entries. The main benefit of doing these small-field contests is the structure, which includes much smaller pods in Weeks 15 and Week 16 (6) and a significantly smaller final (10 teams). It also alters our strategy—which I'll discuss later in this piece—compared to a massive tournament like Best Ball Mania V where we need to prioritize Week 17 correlation.

The bigger buy-in also helps me dial in my convictions. I find it easy to diversify and spread out my exposures when I am firing tons of entries into tournaments with smaller buy-ins, but drafting a high-stakes team really holds your feet to the fire. You quickly figure out which players and constructions you strongly believe in. 

Below is a recap of the team, which I co-drafted with my friend Michael Dubner from Rotoviz. The squad ended up being almost a perfect encapsulation of my ideal way to attack Underdog drafts this summer.

We drew the 1.05 slot. Here's how it played out…

ICYMI: I wrote about bankroll management earlier this summer and how I would allocate my entries on a budget.

Rounds 1-3: Load Up On WR Firepower

Rounds 1-3

Jefferson is my favorite pick in Round 1. I think Bijan Robinson and Breece Hall are very solid selections, but on Underdog I much prefer my teams when I grab the Elite WR at the top of drafts. I know people are worried about the QB play, but Jefferson was dominant with…checks notes…Nick Mullens last year. In Jefferson's four games post-injury without Kirk Cousins, he was on an absurd 2000+ yard pace. 

The Samuel pick was good in a vacuum, but it is aging even better with Brandon Aiyuk trade rumors swirling. Deebo gets dinged up here and there, but he has a monster single-game ceiling in every matchup he suits up for. He had seven games of 18+ PPR points in 2023. In a sea of sketchy Round 2 selections, Deebo is a rock-solid selection who also opens up a cheap QB stacking option in Brock Purdy (spoiler alert).

It's smart to be concerned about older WRs falling off the age cliff, but Diggs is an exception. As Dwain outlined in his WR age piece, Diggs maintained a 28% target share in the second half of 2023 despite Joe Brady shifting the offense to a run-first machine. I'm in lockstep with Dwain here:

"While Diggs' profile isn't perfect, his PPR per game numbers are strong, and his low-end WR2 price tag (WR22) is where I want exposure, slightly above or even with the market. I can't tell you who will lead this Texans passing attack, but I won't be surprised if it is Diggs, so I want shares of all the pieces."

Rounds 4-6: Elite TE & The WR Cliff

Rounds 4-6

2024 is the year of the Elite TE and McBride checks all of the boxes for the next great fantasy tight end. After the team abandoned the ill-fated Zach Ertz Geriatric Experience™, McBride averaged 8+ targets, 6+ receptions, and 67+ yards in his games with Kyler Murray. He finished behind only George Kittle and Travis Kelce in yards per route run at the TE position. When you take one of the Elite TEs in this Round 4-6 range, you essentially free up another roster spot because it allows for a 2-TE build. This is especially important in a year where the late-round TE landscape is largely devoid of talent.

It's trendy right now in best ball circles to be out on the most expensive Packers WR, Reed, due to how spread out their pass-catching usage was in 2023. But this is a spot I don't want to overthink. We have a 2nd-year WR who broke out as a rookie while averaging over 16 PPR/game in the second half of the season tethered to an ascending QB in a pass-happy offense. If there weren't concerns about volume, Reed would be in the Round 2/3 mix. It's already baked into his price and you famously don't need to guess when his spike weeks are coming in best ball.

Smith-Njigba was our first "reach" ahead of ADP, but we preferred him to Christian Watson and the rookies (Ladd McConkey and Keon Coleman). JSN has “second-year breakout” written all over him. He's a 22-year-old first-round pick who dealt with injuries and awful play-calling his rookie year. The outlook is significantly better in 2024 and the hype from training camp has been consistent.

Rounds 7-12: QBs & Zero RB Targets

Rounds 7-12

When you start your draft with five WRs and a TE, it's pretty obvious what positions you need to attack next…

Stroud was a slam dunk selection for us in this range. Not only did he complete a stack with Diggs, but he fell a round past ADP into a range of the draft where the WRs had dried up and the big Zero RB tier had just begun. Similar to taking an Elite TE, grabbing Stroud here also allows us to entertain a 2-QB build, effectively freeing up another roster spot for max flexibility later.

In Rounds 8 and 9, we finally broke the seal at RB. It seems wild to be able to get an RB who scored 21 TDs in 2023 as your RB1, but that's what fell into our lap with Mostert. With Pollard, we get another RB who projects for tons of touches out of the gate, which is always something to covet on Zero RB squads. I like both Pollard and Tyjae Spears in drafts, but this price was too good to pass up on. 

In Round 10, we snagged another QB faller who stacks with one of our early WR selections. The floor/ceiling combo on Purdy is exactly what I'm looking for in a QB2. There's no reason to think the Niners' offense isn't going to be a juggernaut again in 2024. 

In Rounds 11 and 12, we needed to continue to build out our Zero RB room and grabbed two rookie backs, Corum and Lloyd. These are perfect picks in this range for our team. (I should note: if Corum had not slid, Chase Brown would have been our pick and now he's 20 picks more expensive). Still, the contingent upside is clear for these two rookies if something were to happen to Kyren Williams or Josh Jacobs. But there's also a legitimate chance that one (or both) of these guys have a little standalone value. Regardless, these rookies pair well with Pollard and Mostert since we are expecting most of their production to be back-weighted while the former two backs can cover us early.

Rounds 13-18: Landing The Plane

At this point in the draft, we have:

  • 2 QBs
  • 5 WRs
  • 4 RBs
  • 1 TE

Because of this balance, we really had the luxury of attacking the best players available regardless of position.

Rounds 13-18

The main goals down the home stretch were to triangulate our player targets, positional needs, and team-level correlations. 

In this contest, 2/12 teams advance from Round 1, 1/6 teams out of Round 2, and 1/6 teams out of Round 3 before the 10-team Week 17 final. This means that we don't need to force Week 17 correlations like we do in BBMV, and should instead focus on building out our team-level bets. A lot of people don't like stacking up a team without a QB, but I think it's faulty logic. We are only going to have 2-3 QBs on our teams at most, but that doesn't mean we should stop correlating our bets around a few offenses.

With that note, Musgrave gave us a solid TE2 and a Green Bay "phantom stack" (s/o Ron Stewart for coining that phrase) with Reed. Allgeier gives us a much-needed 5th RB and massive contingent upside if something were to happen to Bijan.

Three of our final four picks were Broncos players: Estime, Franklin, and Reynolds. There is so much ambiguity in the Denver offense that I like taking stabs on multiple players because the prices are so cheap. There's also a chance for a big windfall if the entire offense surprises (think Texans last year or the Jags in 2022). Franklin falls into a cohort of players (21-year-old rookie WRs) that break out at a much higher rate than any other age cohort. He's a big part of my 2024 draft plans.

Dortch, like Musgrave with Reed, provided us with another phantom stack (Cardinals with McBride). The camp buzz on him has been resounding, too, which is nice.

Here's the final squad, compliments of the Fantasy Life Best Ball Hub:

Final Big Dog roster

I really like this team. If there is any weakness, it's definitely the RB room. We'll likely need one of those rookie RBs to be a big hit, but we are loaded everywhere else.