Underdog Best Ball Strategy: Exposure Takeaways From 50 Drafts
I don't know how it happened so quickly, but I'm already 50 drafts deep into Best Ball Mania V.
In my early drafts, I've been trying to accomplish a few things:
- Take advantage of the players with mispriced ADPs who I expect to rise in cost over the next couple months
- Attack the structures that I think are going to be the dominant strategies this year
- React quickly to new information from OTAs and minicamps
But as we enter the month of June, things are really starting to slow down and there isn't much new information that shakes up the draft board. This makes it the perfect time to review our portfolio, confirm it reflects our intentions, and decide what we'd like to adjust going forward.
Thanks to Fantasy Life's free Best Ball Hub tool, which allows you to upload a CSV of all your Underdog Drafts and sift through a ton of helpful data about your teams, I'm able to get a nice birds-eye view of my portfolio.
By the way, if you are new to the Best Ball Hub, I put together a tutorial video on how to utilize it last year that you can watch here.
Here are a few interesting takeaways from my first 50 drafts…
My favorite clicks: Zero RB targets & breakout WRs
I currently have 12 players who I have selected more than 20% of the time. This means I'm over double the field (8.3% would be the expected amount if you always drafted off ADP with no deviations) on this cohort:
There are a couple of themes here:
Zero RB targets: Because I'm utilizing Zero RB and Anchor RB in a large number of builds, I'm often selecting RBs in the double-digit rounds. I think rookie backs like Bucky Irving, Ray Davis and Marshawn Lloyd are awesome picks at their current prices. Not only are they the clear No. 2 backs on their teams with massive contingent upside if the starter went down, but I think all have paths to standalone roles. Their three backfield mates who all go in Rounds 4 and 5 — Rachaad White, James Cook, and Josh Jacobs — share classic "dead-zone" back profiles that I love to bet against, specifically with new talent.
Breakout WRs: I think Malik Nabers in Round 3 provides an awesome arbitrage opportunity on the much pricier Marvin Harrison selection in Round 2. … Xavier Legette is a classic boom/bust rookie WR with a clear path to targets in a similar vein to Keon Coleman. Except Legette goes almost 70 picks later. … Jordan Addison flashed as a rookie and won't have to deal with T.J. Hockenson for the majority of the season. I prefer him to a lot of the guys going ahead of him, including Chris Godwin and Calvin Ridley. … Devontez Walker seems to be a forgotten rookie WR by most drafters, but I think there's sneaky opportunity for him to be the deep ball threat in a Lamar Jackson-led offense by the end of the year.
I know what you're thinking, but what's the deal with that Mark Andrews and Brock Bowers exposure...
My favorite structures: Elite TE
I think Elite TE is the dominant strategy in drafts this year. I made an entire analytics-backed argument for the approach in a recent video, but the TLDR goes something like this:
- Elite TEs are cheaper than they've ever been, and the mid-round tight ends are more expensive.
- The pool of Elite TEs is deeper than it's ever been. There are seven legit options with week-winning ceilings.
- The late-round TEs are weaker than they've ever been. Last year was an anomaly with a loaded rookie TE class infusing the late-rounds with an unusual amount of talent.
My exposures reflect how aggressive I'm going after these Top 7 TEs:
Sam LaPorta is the toughest click for me simply because he's the most expensive and I don't think he is a full two rounds better than the other guys, which is what his ADP would indicate. … Travis Kelce is Travis Kelce. The age-risk concerns are priced in at this cost. I need to take more. … I love Trey McBride. He was a monster down the stretch last year. … Mark Andrews is the most mispriced player on the board and he's getting penalized for getting hurt last year. … Dalton Kincaid is a blind spot for me. I need to shift some Andrews love to him. … I'm back in on Kyle Pitts. The situation is so different this year. … I love the price on Kittle here to close out the tier. He can pay off this price tag with just a couple of spike weeks, which is exactly what he did in 2022. And there's massive contingent upside if another Niners pass catcher gets hurt (or traded).
Brock Bowers is the main exception that I'm making outside of the top seven. He's a, dare I say it, generational TE prospect who is a far better player than many of the rookie WRs going ahead of him. We are getting an incredible landing spot discount at pick 100, but elite talent always rises to the top. He's going to be going in the top two rounds in 2025 drafts.
Playoff Correlation: Da Bears edition
I am agnostic on which teams and games stack I target. The point of stacking is to enjoy the benefits of correlation in a tournament setting, not to try to predict which games are going to be good six months out.
That said, I do want to be mixing up my bets around my most rostered stacks within each of those Week 16 and Week 17 game environments.
Thanks to the Hub, I can review my top team stacks and see which of their playoff opponents I have paired with them.
I've selected Chicago rookie QB Caleb Williams in 10% of my drafts. He's a fun guy to stack up because there are three solid Bears pass catchers going early, plus fun bring backs for Week 16 (Lions) and Week 17 (Seahawks).
Here is how I've stacked Williams so far:
And here is how I have game stacked around Williams in Weeks 16 vs. 17:
Charbonnet is one of my most drafted players, so it's no surprise that he is my most popular bringback here. I wouldn't mind mixing in some Tyler Lockett here as well, but it's actually tricky because his ADP is right next to Caleb's, so it's often tough to get both.
Over my next 100 drafts, I will start leaning on the Hub even more to review where my exposures are at and make subtle tweaks to steer me in the direction I want to be going.
