3 fantasy football trends to watch as you get ready for your league draft
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Now that training camp has hit full stride for the Steelers this week, it’s time for Pittsburgh football fans to start focusing on another team as well.
Their own fantasy football team.
Jeff Erickson of Rotowire joins me for this week’s fantasy sports podcast. And he outlines three big trends in fantasy football leagues heading into 2021.
1. Turn back the clock: In Erickson’s words, “We have fully reverted to old school fantasy football where everybody drafts a running back in the first round.”
Erickson is seeing early fantasy drafts where as many as 13 of the first 14 picks have been running backs. For a while, that was always the case in fantasy football. Then as the devaluing and homogenizing of the running back position became prevalent in the NFL, there was a bit of a paradigm change.
Now Erickson says we are going full circle.
“No one wants to get shut out. The backs that get three down snaps are so few and far between now,” Erickson said. “For a while, people would go receiver heavy early. At most, you see one or two people in a draft — unless you have special scoring rules — where they aren’t taking a running back in the first round.”
Erickson says if you want to employ a contrarian strategy because you are drafting at the bottom of the first round, you really have to be precise and smart when you do pick effective running backs later.
Right now, Erickson says the two non-running backs that appear to be cracking the first-round trend are Kansas City pass-catchers Travis Kelce and Tyreek Hill. Normally he says Green Bay Packers wide receiver Davante Adams would be in that mix. But with the questions about quarterback Aaron Rodgers’ future, that may not be wise.
2. Variety is the spice of life: Erickson says he is finding more and more leagues trending toward “super flex” alignments. That means, having an extra flex position that allows for a second quarterback.
“Quarterback is the most important position in the real NFL game,” Erickson said. “But fantasy football doesn’t do it right. If you are in a 10- or 12-team league and you only start one quarterback, arguably half the quarterbacks don’t need to be drafted. You pick one up off the waiver wire.”
As an example, Erickson points to Baker Mayfield who is rated 20th on their board, undraftable in some leagues. That’s disproportionate to Mayfield’s importance to the Browns in real life. Meanwhile, in the fantasy world, owners will prioritize a third running back over some teams’ starting quarterbacks.
That’s why, if you are in a super-flex league, it adds some juice to first-round strategy and makes waiting on quarterbacks come at a price.
3. Patience is a virtue: Well, in fantasy football, it ain’t!
Erickson says he sees a lot of movement to have drafts earlier on the calendar simply because “drafting is fun!”
It is unless there is something significant that happens to your player in terms of injury (like Los Angeles Rams running back Cam Akers tearing an Achilles tendon) or player movement (as in the Adams-Rodgers scenario we outlined earlier).
For instance, Erickson says he’s seen some leagues draft even before the NFL Draft occurs, which I think is nuts. Especially with the aforementioned value placed on running backs.
Erickson also sees a trend toward more people playing in dynasty and keeper leagues.
Also in our podcast, Erickson talks about which running backs are going atop most draft boards, why he is devaluing Derrick Henry a bit and where he slots Steelers rookie running back Najee Harris versus some other experts. Plus, we get into some fantasy baseball and golf talk, too.