13 days until the Hall of Fame game…
In today’s Fantasy Life Newsletter presented by Underdog Fantasy:
Good news surrounding Isiah Pacheco’s Week 1 availability
The Washington Commanders officially have a new owner
How to Construct a Best Ball Roster: Professor Pete is here
Lessons from 100+ Underdog Drafts: Ian has thoughts
It’s 7/21. Take it away, Ian Hartitz…
The last few days have resulted in a whirlwind of news for rising second-year Chiefs RB Isiah Pacheco:
The Athletic’s Nate Taylor reported the Chiefs hoped to have Pacheco (labrum, hand) back “midway through camp.”
Pacheco was spotted at training camp practice on Wednesday, although he reportedly wore a yellow “no contact” vest.
On Thursday, Pacheco was asked if he would be ready for Week 1. His answer: “Absolutely.”
Credit to Pacheco for playing in the Super Bowl with a broken hand and an injured shoulder; good thing those issues should be healed enough for him to resume his role as the Chiefs’ No. 1 RB if his latest statement is true.
Of course, this role didn’t exactly turn Pacheco into a world-beater in fantasy land last season. He never played on 60% or more of the offense’s snaps in a single game and wound up with more contests under 30% (7) than he did over 50% (3).
It’s challenging for primary early-down RBs to boom in full-PPR fantasy, especially on a generally pass-first offense like the Chiefs. Consider: Patrick Mahomes’ league-high 73 pass attempts inside the 10-yard line were a full 20 more than second-place Kirk Cousins (53).
The Kareem Hunt years were awfully prolific in fantasy land; just realize it’s been a long time since this offense has produced a high-end asset in the backfield.
Andy Reid RB1 fantasy football history
— Ian Hartitz (@Ihartitz)
Jun 20, 2023
We now have a full presidential term of evidence that the Mahomes-led Chiefs are happy to utilize a committee system and not overly feature any specific RB.
It sure seems likely that Jerick McKinnon and Clyde Edwards-Helaire will (again) handle the majority of pass-game duties, but – similar to 2022 Josh Jacobs and Rhamondre Stevenson – it’s worth considering if the Chiefs’ 2022 seventh-round pick could handle an every-down role if called upon.
Pacheco certainly didn’t look out of place catching the football when asked. His 5-59-0 performance against the Bengals in the AFC Championship was particularly impressive, and on the season he put up some pretty awesome underlying efficiency metrics with his limited receiving opportunities.
Among 70 RBs with 15-plus targets in 2022 (including playoffs):
PFF receiving grade: 74.3 (No. 10)
Passer rating when targeted: 107.3 (No. 12)
Yards per reception: 10.3 (No. 4)
Yards after the catch per reception: 13.6 (No. 1)
Yards per route run: 1.01 (tied for No. 33)
I discussed the potential for Pacheco to be a mid-round RB who we regret not drafting more with Dwain McFarland on the latest Fantasy Life Podcast.
Pacheco still isn’t someone I feel the need to get in every draft – especially if tier-ending QB Deshaun Watson and TE Darren Waller are still on the board – but it’s fair to wonder why the Chiefs’ physical early-down grinder isn’t warranting the same sort of treatment as someone like Dameon Pierce (RB22, 70.1).
A full bill of good health and even a small uptick in pass-down work could quickly land Pacheco inside fantasy’s weekly upside RB2 conversation.
Don’t be afraid to get some shares of the projected lead back in an offense led by Patrick f*cking Mahomes at this currently reasonable cost.
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Looking for your edge in Weekly Winners drafts? Pete Overzet has you covered.
Whether you are looking to win $3,000,000 in a massive tournament or just want some mock draft preparation for upcoming season-long drafts, understanding best ball roster construction is the most important thing you need to know before diving in. Take it away, Pete…
Everyone is used to filling out a starting lineup when drafting a fantasy team in a managed league, but best ball drafting is an entirely different animal.
Because we can’t make any roster moves after the draft, we must rely on our structure to not only withstand the chaos of the regular season, but also possess the upside needed to advance through the three-week playoff gauntlet and, in the case of Best Ball Mania IV, best 440 other teams in the Week 17 final.
There are all kinds of debates in the best ball space on what roster constructions are the best…
But the beauty of best ball is that there is no silver bullet structure you need to employ.
All of the aforementioned strategies are viable (well, almost all of them) when executed correctly. The key is to make sure that the subsequent picks you make complement that initial structure in a way that gives your team as much upside as possible.
Here are five simple tips for how to construct successful teams on Underdog:
1️⃣ Try to stay within these positional limits.
Although you can mostly attack the beginning of the draft however you prefer, there are general guardrails for positional allocation that we know yield the best results.
We have only 18 roster spots to work with on Underdog and need to fill a weekly starting lineup of 1 QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, 1 FLEX, and 1 TE. There is no one hard and fast rule on how many players you should take at each position, but I generally stay within this framework:
Quarterbacks: 2-3
Running Backs: 4-7
Wide Receivers: 6-10
Tight Ends: 2-3
One interesting dynamic on Underdog is the push/pull of half-point PPR scoring (devalues pass catchers relative to full point per reception) and being able to start up to 4 WRs weekly (3 WRs and a FLEX) compared to only 3 RBs (2 RBs and a FLEX).
But drafters have clearly made up their minds in 2023 as WRs are being drafted at a higher clip than ever before:
BONUS: Dwain outlined why this ADP shift is optimal in a recent piece.
It’s no surprise that the team that won the $2,000,000 top prize in Best Ball Mania III and the team that won the $1,000,000 regular season prize both selected five WRs before Round 10. That’s a good rule of thumb to keep in mind as you draft in Underdog rooms.
2️⃣ Draft like you are right.
This might be the most important lesson in all of best ball drafting. A lot of noobie drafters have the tendency to worry about how things could go wrong with their early picks and then try to protect against that later in the draft (e.g. drafting Tyler Allgeier in case Bijan Robinson gets hurt).
This kind of thinking will limit your upside and drive you toward suboptimal constructions.
Instead, assume every pick you made was a total smash and let that dictate your future decisions.
Did you start your draft with three straight RBs in a hyper-fragile build like I did the other day with Christian McCaffrey, Tony Pollard, and Rhamondre Stevenson?
Yes, those are some nice RBs, but I then waited to grab my fourth (and final) RB. Why? Because I used my three most valuable picks on the RB position and worked under the assumption that they will all have great seasons and cover the 2 RB and FLEX slots each and every week.
I used the rest of my picks to attack other positions. Speaking of which…
😃 The Commanders officially have a new owner. Fantasy Life’s fearless leader is PUMPED.
😮 Mary Jo White concluded her investigation on Dan Snyder. His fine includes a LOT of zeros.
🦁 Detroit got Jared Goff a former second-round WR. Officially official.
✈️ Watching the Jets on Hard Knocks should be a fun time. Robert Saleh is embracing things.
🚓 This first-round WR got charged with speeding and reckless driving. C’mon, man.
👀 Madden’s CB ratings are LIVE. No. 1 might surprise you.
🤮 The Colts are the latest team to unveil new alternate uniforms. I am not a fan.
👑 This TE got added to the Madden #99Club. Kings stay kings.
📺 Betting Life meets best ball. Join Mr. President for his draft TODAY.
Ian has completed 134 best ball drafts at the time of this writing. Putting aside his need to get outside and touch more grass, getting in this many reps has allowed him to test out all sorts of different strategies while also obtaining a solid feel for exactly what makes 2023 drafts unique.
Without further adieu: 10 best ball takeaways from your boy.
As always: It’s a great day to be great.
America hates RBs
It wasn’t uncommon in past years to see fantasy’s top-12 RBs off the board shortly into Round 2.
These days? The current ADP RB12, Najee Harris, is falling into Round 4.
Running backs are going 10+ picks later than they usually do at pretty much every level of fantasy football drafts.
Overall pick ADP when RBX is off the board 2019-2023 (PPR)
— Ian Hartitz (@Ihartitz)
Jun 22, 2023
The WR avalanche and influx of early-round QBs have combined to push RBs further down draft boards than any year in recent memory. This has resulted in studs like Nick Chubb (pick 14.3), Jonathan Taylor (17.6) and Tony Pollard (20.9) carrying second-round ADP.
Hell, you can get Derrick Henry (23) in Round 3 on occasion. In this economy, no less!
This note doesn’t mean you have to deploy a bully-RB strategy in every draft, but my favorite teams usually managed to come away with one or two backs inside of the first three rounds.
The elongated WR2-3 tier allows drafters to still get a handful of quality options at the position before the Round 8 cliff really makes life tough; don’t be afraid to spend top-36 picks on RBs who would profile as legit Round 1 options in past years.
📊 Week 17 matters
The nature of Underdog Fantasy’s Best Ball Mania IV prize structure makes it so Week 17 truly matters more than any other individual week.
Fantasy Life’s Peter Overzet did a great job breaking down this concept earlier in the offseason and summarized the strategy with the following notes:
“Don’t worry. I fully understand that it might seem silly to plan for games in January 2024 while we’re still in May 2023. However, there are concrete variables that we can account for months out, like players on the same team and their Week 17 opponents.
We don’t know which specific games are going to go off, but we do know that when a game does produce a ton of points, the players’ production in those games is correlated.
Overall, the key is to accomplish these correlation goals in tandem with the other important pillars of best ball drafting. Not at their expense.
The best way to think about Week 17 correlation is as a tiebreaker whenever you are on the clock.”
Week 17 is only a piece of the puzzle – but it’s a piece nevertheless. Keep the matchups handy and use the correlation as a tiebreaker, not a rule of thumb.
Like Ricky Bobby once said: First or last. Why not try to maximize every single potential edge – even the small ones – as much as possible?
✈️ QBs are flying off the board faster than ever
There have usually been a few QBs who creep into the early rounds of drafts each year, but 2023 is setting a new standard for early-round drafting at the position.
2023: 6 QBs have an ADP inside the overall top-50.
2022: 4
2021: 3
2020: 2
2019: 2
Justin Herbert (pick 54.4) and Trevor Lawrence (66.6) aren’t too far off either.
There’s little debate that dual-threat aliens like Josh Allen (27.8) and Jalen Hurts (25.4) warrant early-round consideration. Overall, 13 of 14 QBs with 125-plus carries in a single season in NFL history posted top-12 fantasy numbers on a per-game basis.
High-usage rushers at QB join high-volume receiving RBs as the closest thing fantasy football has to cheat codes.
Failure to lock in one of these early-round QBs could leave your roster lacking in upside at that spot, but there are several later-round options that offer similar archetypes at a far cheaper cost.
Specifically, I’ve tried to come away with theoretical upside QB1s like Deshaun Watson (84), Anthony Richardson (103.8), Daniel Jones (113.9) and/or Kyler Murray (152.9) in drafts when I haven’t dipped my toes into the early-round QB waters.
Underpaid NFL RBs finding out about zero-RB fantasy football draft strategy
— Ian Hartitz (@Ihartitz)
Jul 20, 2023
