Introduction
The total passing attempts and passing yards in the NFL has risen in six consecutive seasons, one record breaking year after another. Last season, the NFL team passing averages were 3,770 yards and 25.1 touchdowns. As recently as 2011, and for all of the years prior, those averages would have been worthy of a top-12 finish in fantasy football. While the NFL landscape is changing, the standard fantasy league has not adapted. With more viable starting quarterbacks than ever before, the position has become devalued.
You'll find running backs, wide receivers, and even tight ends being drafted in the first round of fantasy football drafts. Quarterbacks, the most valuable position in the NFL, regularly will not come off of the board until the third round. Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, and Drew Brees are three of the highest paid players in the NFL with seven MVPs and five Lombardi trophies between them. Those three would arguably be the first three players chosen if an organization was looking to win a Super Bowl in 2014. However, in standard fantasy football leagues, the opportunity cost of drafting those players early on is so high that you would be doing yourself a diservice to take that route. Two-quarterback leagues bring the balance back to fantasy football.
To understand why quarterbacks are made more valuable in two-quarterback leagues, look no further than the principle of Value Based Drafting:
The value of a player is determined not by the number of points he scores, but by how much he outscores his peers at his particular position.
Since the number of starting quarterbacks doubles in two-quarterback leagues, when establishing a baseline to compare the quarterback position, the bar would be set much lower. Therefore, instead of judging the advantage that Manning has on a player such as Jay Cutler, we would then be comparing Manning to the likes of Jake Locker. This cements Manning as a first round value, thus balancing the value of the quarterback position in respect to the others.
Strategy
For those who are new to two-quarterback leagues, the necessary mindset may require some adjustments. For example, passing on Calvin Johnson, whose ADP is among the top-six overall, for Rodgers is simply not something that would be considered in standard leagues. Nor would be drafting Andrew Luck before the likes of Giovani Bernard or Brandon Marshall. It's a different ball-game though and the fear of reaching for a quarterback may result in a void that you're scrambling to recover from the entire season.
Even when viewing the top-100 below, please keep in mind that no draft is ever the same and quarterbacks may fly off the board quickly or tend to float around longer than expected. In order to maximize the value of each of your selections, it is crucial to pay extra attention to the quarterback tiers - Sigmund Bloom provided his pre-camp quarterback tiers here. If a quarterback run is on the horizon, do not be afraid to get in front of the wave. Conversely, if those tiers are holding up well, you can be patient and target non-quarterbacks.
There are two distinct approaches to two-quarterback drafts. The first would be placing a high priority on quarterbacks with the goal of securing a weekly advantage over your opponents at the position. The second would be to carry over the late round quarterback mentality that works so effectively in standard leagues; this appoach hinges on your ability to stream a group of low-end quarterbacks well enough that your advantages at the other positions put your team over the top.
Quarterback Heavy
Personally, minimizing risk is of the utmost importance and the idea of rostering one of the best, if not the best one-two punch at the quarterback position is most appealing. Ideally, you would like to have two QB1s and in order to achieve that, you must be willing to spend at least two of your first five selections on a quarterback. Your draft position also plays a major role in your plan of attack.
For example, having a top-four draft pick is a favorable draw. In these cases, you're able to draft an elite running back and then will still have two more picks within the top-28. In one offseason mock, I drafted first overall and was able to secure Jamaal Charles, Tom Brady, and Russell Wilson with my first three picks. If I were to choose not to draft two quarterbacks with those second and third picks, I would have run the risk of missing out on an entire tier or even two before my next picks came up near the turn of round four. When my fourth round pick finally came up, there were already 15 quarterbacks selected.
In another two-quarterback mock for Rotoworld, I had the fifth pick. With the goal of securing the best combination of quarterbacks, I chose Manning in the first round. If necessary, I would have taken my second quarterback as early as round two, but the QB1 tier held up well in this draft. As a result, I was able to follow that up with Eddie Lacy in the second round and Arian Foster in the third round before drafting Colin Kaepernick as my second quarterback just as the QB1 tier was coming to an end.
Quarterback Streaming
If you're more of a gambler, the streaming approach may be more appealing. Unlike standard leagues however, you will not be able to use the waiver wire as an extension of your bench. Therefore, after passing on quarterbacks in the early rounds, you would need to ensure that you're able to secure at least three viable options later on. Quite often, all of the starting quarterbacks will be off of the board by the end of the ninth round. As a result, you would need to begin filling that position in the sixth round at the latest or risk ending up with only two starting quarterbacks, both on the low-end of the spectrum and with no other options to stream. If handled with care, this streaming approach can be feasible and offers the most upside, but does bring along a much higher degree of risk. In leagues with 10 or less teams, this strategy becomes more ideal.
Middle Road
While those are the two distinct approaches, there is also a middle road. Your goal would be to build a well-balanced team without the want for a weekly advantage at the quarterback position, but instead just to be competitive at the position each week. Using this strategy, your aim would be to secure a player in the QB1 tier and another in the QB2 tier. Drafting a third quarterback to stream with your QB2 would also be an option that would add some upside. Just as the other two approaches, this would also require a close eye on the depth of each quarterback tier and then drafting your starters just as their respective tiers are going off of the board. A note of caution is that this strategy would inherently be more risky if your selections are near a turn since it would be tougher to gauge the collapse of each tier.
Third Quarterback
Regardless of the route that you take, with only 32 starting quarterbacks, it’s important to get not only three starting quarterbacks, but three quarterbacks with different Bye Weeks. One week can be the difference between making the playoffs or not and so it would be a risky proposition to head into the season with only two quarterbacks on your roster. If you're not streaming, after you no longer have a need for your third quarterback, they would become a useful trading commodity for strengthening your starting lineup prior to the stretch run. By rostering only two starting quarterbacks, in order to avoid a goose egg, you may have to pay a king's ransom for a spot starter. Superflex leagues would allow for some more flexibilty and not make a third quarterback as imperative, but it would still be a major advantage to have three players at the position which scores more fantasy points than any other.
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