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DRAFT offers weekly snake draft contests with 5-man rosters (1 QB, 2 RB, 2 WR/TE) with 0.5-point PPR scoring (the same as FanDuel). There is no salary cap on DRAFT which makes it unique to how you play compared to the other daily fantasy sites. Teams are built through live snake drafts that have 30-second timer per pick. The most common contest sizes are Head-to-Head, 3-Team, 6-Team, and 10-Team.
We will explore both the rankings and draft strategies for each of these four DRAFT sizes. To understand why players are ranked where they are, be sure to check out the overall rankings where I will have in-depth breakdowns of some of the top options and some personal favorites down the list. When developing these rankings we will be excluding the Thursday Night games and only focus on the main slate on DRAFT, the Sunday and Monday games.
If you want to follow me on DRAFT my username is "Eaglezzz" as I sometimes will post contests and would love to play along with fellow Footballguys like yourselves. Please feel free to contact me on Twitter with any questions or if you would like to discuss this article or draft strategies. I welcome constructive feedback on the article and as always best of luck in this week's contests.
WEEK 11 - QUICK NEWS AND NOTES
This is the second to last week of bye weeks and with that comes a condensed player pool as this week we will be without players from Buffalo, Cleveland, Miami, New England, NY Jets, and San Francisco. Excluding those teams takes a dip into the overall player pool and you will have to dig deep at the end of drafts. We also can disregard the Thursday Night game between Green Bay and Seattle, and with the six teams on bye as well, the positions will be thin when drafting in 10-man leagues. Taking away eight teams this week that all have some good options at all the positions will make for a tougher roster construction on DRAFT this week. Another critical area to look at is injuries as the weeks go by and in Week 11 they are starting to pile up. We have big names such as James Conner, Joe Mixon, Chris Thompson, Royce Freeman, and Peyton Barber all at running back that are either out already or that have their status up in the air. At wide receiver, we also have some question marks now with Adam Thielen, A.J. Green, Marvin Jones, Chris Godwin, Jamison Crowder, and Jordy Nelson. These are all big names to watch as we go into the weekend and with only having to roster five players it makes it hard to draft these guys with comparable options out there. It is almost better to see your opponents selecting these players with the questionable tag as it could give you a slight edge on the week.
The popular high scoring games to target this week are going to be Kansas City vs LA Rams (63.5 O/U), Philadelphia vs New Orleans (56.0 O/U), Tampa Bay vs NY Giants (52.0 O/U), and Carolina vs Detroit (49.5 O/U). It will be hard to not focus only on the Monday Night game between the Chiefs and the Rams as we haven't seen an over/under as high as 63.5 all season long. There are so many big-name players in that game and the over/under is one of the highest we have seen all season. Whenever you are in a position to choose between two players you feel have similar upside you might just want to choose the one that is from one of these five games as they all seem to ones that will have some high scores and lots of fantasy points from all the star players involved.
HEAD-TO-HEAD DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY
- Todd Gurley RB1
- Saquon Barkley RB2
- Ezekiel Elliott RB3
- Michael Thomas WR1
- Julio Jones WR2
- Patrick Mahomes II QB1
- DeAndre Hopkins WR3
- Odell Beckham WR4 (or Tyreek Hill)
- Melvin Gordon RB4 (or Christian McCaffrey, Kareem Hunt, Alvin Kamara)
- Carson Wentz QB2 (also consider Jared Goff, Drew Brees)
For a head-to-head contest you need to look for the top 2 quarterbacks, 4 running backs, and 4 wide receivers/tight ends - For a total of 10 players. The main key to look at when drafting in H2H contests is to know what your opponent is doing. You want to watch if he takes WR/WR to start out the draft you know that you can draft your WR positions with your last two picks. Same goes if he drafts a QB or RB/RB, you know that you can leverage that information and wait at those positions.
In H2H drafts I typically come in with a game plan and like to stick closely to it, and let the other drafter I am up against decide what type of team I will build depending on their picks. Often times you will find others that like to draft their favorite team, maybe they just follow DRAFT's own projections/ADP and stick to those numbers just going down the list. I feel like this week you can almost just go with any of the top running backs with your first pick and follow it up with WR/RB depending on who you like with your top four picks. This week at quarterback I think Patrick Mahomes II is the top pick at the position, but I would still rather lock in my two running backs before I pulled the trigger on him. If you miss out on Mahomes I feel you can still safely select Carson Wentz at the end of the H2H draft as he has a strong game script in his favor against the Saints this week.
3-TEAM DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY
- Todd Gurley RB1
- Saquon Barkley RB2
- Ezekiel Elliott RB3
- Melvin Gordon RB4
- Christian McCaffrey RB5
- Michael Thomas WR1
- Julio Jones WR2
- Patrick Mahomes II QB1
- DeAndre Hopkins WR3
- Odell Beckham WR4
- Tyreek Hill WR5
- Antonio Brown WR6
- Kareem Hunt RB6 (or Alvin Kamara)
- Carson Wentz QB2
- Jared Goff QB3
For the 3-man contests, you will need to look at ranking 15 total players consisting of 3 quarterbacks, 6 running backs, and 6 wide receivers/tight ends. The priority here is the RB and WR spots as quarterbacks will often fall and getting either Carson Wentz or Aaron Rodgers at the end of the draft is a win.
The best advice for drafting in 3-mans would be to come up with your solid 15 player ranking list that you feel most comfortable with and don't get frustrated if the top players that you have on that list get taken right before your pick. If you have picks 1.01 or 1.03 you will be picking at the turn and can have an advantage in following your league mates roster construction closely and be able to know when to take certain positions or if you wanted to stack players you will have an easier time doing so with back to back picks.
6-TEAM DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY
- Todd Gurley RB1
- Saquon Barkley RB2
- Ezekiel Elliott RB3
- Melvin Gordon RB4
- Christian McCaffrey RB5
- Michael Thomas WR1
- Kareem Hunt RB6
- Alvin Kamara RB7
- James Conner RB8 (Probable)
- Julio Jones WR2
- Patrick Mahomes II QB1
- DeAndre Hopkins WR3 (Probable)
- Odell Beckham WR4
- Tyreek Hill WR5
- David Johnson RB9
- Antonio Brown WR6
- Carson Wentz QB2
- Adam Thielen WR7 (Probable)
- Zach Ertz TE/WR8
- Robert Woods WR9
- Keenan Allen WR10 (Questionable)
- Brandin Cooks WR11
- Leonard Fournette RB10
- Jared Goff QB3
- Mike Evans WR12
- Drew Brees QB4
- Marlon Mack RB11
- Kerryon Johnson RB12
- Deshaun Watson QB5
- Cam Newton QB6 (Probable)
The running back position feels extra rich this week and if you can some how land two of the top eight backs this week I think your team will get off to a great start. Todd Gurley has to be the top choice once again but after that the field is pretty level with Barkley, Elliott, Gordon, McCaffrey, Hunt, Kamara, and Conner all in prime spots for high volume games. Wide receiver is not quite as deep this week but does have some big names at the top with Thomas, Jones, Hopkins, Beckham, Hill, and Brown who all have very good matchups. I think Mahomes is the top quarterback play on the week with Carson Wentz and Jared Goff not too far behind as far as matchups and opportunities go. The Quarterback position is really jumbled this week after Mahomes at the top as you can feel safe with Wentz, Goff, Brees, Watson, or Newton.
If I am picking at the turn I would be thrilled to land a pair of those top eight running backs and almost think that gives you an advantage over the competition. After those top eight running backs, there are also some other good alternatives with the likes of Johnson, Fournette, Mack, and Kerryon Johnson that all should have heavy usage this week and all have touchdown potential because of the number of touches they should see. After the top six wide receivers, you still have some big names in Thielen, Ertz, Woods, Allen, Cooks, Kelce, and Evans that you can settle on to fill out your draft. The key this week will be going heavy on the running back and wide receiver positions and relying on your player rankings and hoping some of your favorite plays fall to you.
10-TEAM DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY
- Todd Gurley RB1
- Saquon Barkley RB2
- Ezekiel Elliott RB3
- Melvin Gordon RB4
- Christian McCaffrey RB5
- Michael Thomas WR1
- Kareem Hunt RB6
- Alvin Kamara RB7
- James Conner RB8 (Probable)
- Julio Jones WR2
- Patrick Mahomes II QB1
- DeAndre Hopkins WR3 (Probable)
- Odell Beckham WR4
- Tyreek Hill WR5
- David Johnson RB9
- Antonio Brown WR6
- Carson Wentz QB2
- Adam Thielen WR7 (Probable)
- Zach Ertz TE/WR8
- Robert Woods WR9
- Keenan Allen WR10 (Questionable)
- Brandin Cooks WR11
- Leonard Fournette RB10
- Jared Goff QB3
- Mike Evans WR12
- Drew Brees QB4
- Marlon Mack RB11
- Kerryon Johnson RB12
- Deshaun Watson QB5
- Cam Newton QB6 (Probable)
- Travis Kelce TE/WR13
- Corey Davis WR14
- Tevin Coleman RB13
- Alex Collins RB14
- Mark Ingram RB15
- Alshon Jeffery WR15
- Emmanuel Sanders WR16
- Kenny Golladay WR17
- Matt Ryan QB7
- JuJu Smith-Schuster WR18
- Dion Lewis RB16
- Joe Mixon RB17 (Questionable)
- Dalvin Cook RB18
- Amari Cooper WR19
- Phillip Lindsay RB19
- Tyler Boyd WR20
- Adrian Peterson RB20
- Ben Roethlisberger QB8
- Andrew Luck QB9
- Philip Rivers QB10
The 10-man contests become more and more difficult as bye weeks and injuries start to pile up and in Week 11 we are dealing with both of those issues. The drop off is bigger than normal at the running back position so you are going to want to make sure you have that position filled by the end of round three if possible. At wide receiver, you can always seem to be able to find value late in these drafts so choosing a second receiver over your second running back seems foolish in the 10-man format. Also look to pair your final receiver spot with a quarterback in the last round to give your team a little boost.
Stacking is something you will want to look at in these 10-man leagues as you will be looking for advantages to put up big points and get on top of the leaderboard. You can look to stack a QB/WR from the same team or if you are attacking a certain game you can try to draft players from both teams. In the 10-man leagues, you are shooting to win it of course but these leagues offer top-three prizes to land in the money. Even finishing in third place out of 10 teams can be a very profitable outcome so building a team with a high floor with a couple of high ceiling type players and a possible stack can help you get there.
The 10-mans look like strong options to play this week as there is plenty of depth to go around this week at the RB and WR positions and you should expect to be able to build some solid rosters because of the depth. Even with eight teams on bye week it should not effect your ability to build a very competitive 10-man team this week. Follow the news closely this week if you are playing 10-mans and fine tune those 31-50 player rankings as we lead up to the start of Week 10.
As always best of luck in this week's DRAFTs!