Photo: Rich Barnes, USA Today Sports

A month into the dynasty fantasy football season is the perfect time to assess your team. This should be an annual time where you begin to consider your team’s future. After a month, you can consider whether you should use future assets or young players to contend this year or begin to rebuild your team for the future.

This article will help you make an informed decision on your team’s direction.

Decision Time

One of the most common mistakes dynasty general managers make is to enter a rebuild prematurely. Too often, dynasty GMs commit to a long-term dynasty rebuild in the offseason that closes the opportunity for their team to compete if they have players that overperform.

For example, think if you went into the season this year and sold all your productive players on a team like C.J. Stroud, Puka Nacua, Sam LaPorta, and DeVon Achane. Your premature commitment to rebuilding could cap your ability to capitalize on your breakout in 2023.

If you entered the season planning to contend this year, four or five games into the season are a great time to evaluate the direction of your team.

The dynasty rebuild is a declaration by a dynasty general manager that the future is a more optimistic time to win than the present.

There are two ways to evaluate the performance of your team.

First, look at your power ranking. The easiest metric to use is all-play records, which is your record if you played every team every week. This is an easy baseline to get an idea of where you rank among other teams. There is less variance than your actual record, making it a better indicator of your team’s strength than just the record.

If your team is in the top half of the league, you are on the good side of the equation. You are on the bad side if your team is in the bottom half.

Second, look at your actual record. While an all-play record is a better indication of your team’s true strength, your actual record is your reality. Again, ask yourself whether your team is in the top half of the record or the bottom half of the record.

If your record is in the top half, your team is on the good side of this equation. You are a bad team if your team is in the bottom half.

These two questions create a combination of four mindsets that can be seen in the boxes below.