High-Stakes Fantasy Football Strategy. Tips for Drafting on NFFC.

We live in the golden age of fantasy football, which means there are all kinds of options for where you can play.

If you are looking to get your feet wet in real money leagues with big-time prizes, look no further than the NFFC — a high-stakes fantasy football site that offers contests at different price points. Their flagship “Primetime” contest boasts a $250,000 top prize.

Interested in drafting in a Primetime Contest? Sign up here to see the available draft rooms and start drafting for $250,000 TODAY on NFFC!

Fantasy Life has been drafting on NFFC all offseason and today I’m going to share with you some of the important things to consider when drafting on NFFC so you can stay ahead of the competition. 

Pay Attention To Third-Round Reversal

Most snake drafts follow a similar course, with each drafter getting one pick per round. After a round is over, the following round is in the reverse order of the previous round.

But NFFC gives us a slight remix on the tried and true snake format with third-round reversal, aka 3RR:

3RR allows the team drafting from the end of the round (1.12 and 2.1) to begin Round 3 (3.1) after also starting Round 2 instead of picking at 3.12.

It’s an interesting wrinkle that helps balance the top-heavy nature of drafts. It never feels fair when the team drafting from the 1.01 is also able to get two more Top 25 players at the 2-3 turn, so this helps level the playing field.

Best of all, on NFFC you can actually set your draft order preferences before the draft to remove some of the randomness of auto-generated slots. I’ll explain…

Set Your KDS! (Wait, What Is KDS?!)

KDS stands for “Kentucky Derby Style,” which allows owners to rank their draft order preferences from most desirable to least desired before the leagues are randomly selected. 

It’s a mechanism for giving owners a little say in their draft slot and results in most managers receiving a more preferred draft spot than the random slot would have given them.

Before your league drafts, you can edit and re-order the draft slots however you see fit:

KDS pairs well with 3RR (look at all this cool lingo!) because it allows you to really think through the value pockets of the first three rounds. 

Because I love the WRs at the 1-2 turn, having a late pick in Round 1 can be extremely advantageous. As you can see below, it’s possible to lock up two elite WRs at 1.12 and 2.01 and also start the third round with Tee Higgins:

In a normal snake format, the Justin Jefferson drafter would be gifted Tee Higgins at 3.1, but with the 3RR in place, their selection (D.J. Moore) is in a different WR tier, which helps offset the advantage of locking up one of the top two players.

Depending on how you view the WR tiers (I think there’s a big drop-off after Higgins), you quickly realize how the KDS and 3RR should heavily factor into your strategy.

Feel free to review NFFC ADP on Fantasy Life so you can plot out your ideal start and, subsequently, your KDS preferences.

6-Point Passing TDs

One other wrinkle to note about NFFC scoring: It is 6 points per passing TD.

This is a very important distinction from most QB scoring formats, which generally award only 4 points for each passing TD.

The result of this scoring shift is both obvious and subtle at the same time:

• The obvious part is that QBs go slightly earlier on NFFC because the top QBs can really separate from the pack.
• The subtle part is that QBs who primarily rely on their rushing upside for fantasy points (Anthony Richardson is the prime example) are less valuable in this format.

The “Konami” cheat code for rushing QBs is far less pronounced when 60 yards rushing (that’s a lot for a QB) is worth the same as a single TD pass. 

“Boring” pocket passers like Dak Prescott, Kirk Cousins and Geno Smith go ahead of Richardson on NFFC because of this dynamic:

Bonus tip: If you miss out on a top-eight option, don’t be afraid to wait. We recently got Tua Tagovailoa in the 11th round of a Primetime draft.

WRs Are King on NFFC

NFFC is a full point-per-reception scoring system where you can start up to four WRs each week (3 WRs + 1 FLEX):

Similar to how the 6-point vs. 4-point scoring for TDs encourages early QB selections, this scoring setting requires you to prioritize the WR position early in drafts. 

In best ball contests, we are often able to make up for our lack of quality at the WR position (if we start with an RB-heavy build) with a large number of WRs because we don’t have to guess which of our bench WRs is going to score — the computer does it for us.

But in a managed league, we need to hand-select which WRs we start each week, which puts an even bigger premium on the top WRs who have the ability to earn a consistently high target share.

To further illustrate this, check out how quickly the WR talent drops off around Rounds 8 and 9:

Players like Zay Jones and DJ Chark will have some serviceable weeks this year, but good luck guessing when.

This dynamic should lead drafters to lock up at least four, but likely five, WRs before Round 8.

Here is a start we recently executed on a Ship Chasing stream:

Even though we scooped up three RBs in the first five rounds, we made the decision to punt QB and TE so we could solidify the WR position considering its importance in this format.

Bonus tip: Why JSN is a slam-dunk pick, even after the injury, in managed leagues like NFFC.

If you’d like to see more drafts on NFFC before you jump in, be sure to check out Dwain and Ian’s recent escapades on our YouTube channel.