In addition to our friends here at FFToday, there are websites and
magazines by the hundreds devoted to giving you every edge on draft
day. The day before the draft all of us are geniuses--we've studied,
analyzed, plotted rankings, even conducted our own mock drafts (at
least those of us without a life). We just know that Marshall Faulk,
Randy Moss, Brett Favre and Wesley Walls will soon be ours. However,
drafts can and do go bad, and this article is geared towards those
of us who have stunk up draft day. You can still win it all.
I don't know about you, but I always enter draft day with an unwarranted
"feeling" that I will draft early (guaranteeing a super stud in the
first round) or very late (which means two close picks and two studs
out of the first two rounds). In my fourteen team league, the 13th
and 14th picks seem to always do well for that reason.
Then, reality sets in.
Almost certainly you get a middle of the round pick, with less available
than the high picks and yet more decisions to "blow" than the low
picks. I can tell you that the second round pick is a long time coming
around while second guessing yourself after your pick. Then of course,
it gets worse. Every player you want gets nabbed one or two picks
before your turn. You see a run on a given position -- you panic and
grab a lesser player at that position instead of the right player
for you at that moment of the draft. You forget your pre-draft strategy,
if you had one. You let the derision of your fellow owners get to
you as they laugh so hard at your selections that they wet the floor.
You lose your confidence. You may turn to the solace of alcohol --
you think, "Hey, baseball season's only six months away!"
Don't lose heart. All the above has happened to most of us, with the
possible exception of the floor-wetting. In the last four years of
our league, which drafts anew every year, I have made the playoffs
every year, made the Superbowl three times, and won it twice. And
I am known as a poor-to-average drafter by the other owners. I say
this not to toot my own horn (really) but to give you hope if your
own draft is less than successful. Here's how you can turn your loser
into a winner:
1. It's not as bad as it seems: Simply
stated, you must believe this. If you doubt me, remember this fact:
In 1996, I won our league even though the first running back I drafted
was Aaron Hayden. Aaron Hayden! (By the way, I know this undercuts
my credibility severely.) You will have at least one or two higher
quality players on your team, no matter how badly you've chosen. My
1996 team also had Brett Favre. Furthermore, you will probably have
one surprise player who performs better than expected, as Michael
Jackson did for my team. These players will form the nucleus around
whom you will rebuild your team.
2. Pay particular attention
to fielding your best team early in the season: You still have
ample time to fix your draft. Just remember that every team is a little
unsettled early in the season as they find the right mix of players.
Some players live up to expectations, while some over- and some under-perform.
Use this time to your advantage! Make intelligent decisions in fielding
your week-to-week lineup. Of course, this means to be aware of bye
weeks, read the injury reports, etc. But more than this, you must
look at matchups, and maximize them. Two similar players are likely
to perform differently if one is up against the Bengals defense, and
one is up against the Ravens'. Early on, while you are improving your
team, try to steal one or two early wins against an unthinking, contented,
well-drafted team. All wins count in the end, and you will be glad
you paid attention early.
3. Be aggressive with free agents:
Everyone is looking to improve their teams, so you must be out in
front. Be informed; pay attention on Sunday to the notable performers
in the league and be ready to claim them right away. Look online and
find out who is injured and whether there are capable backups ready
to step in. In the NFL, injuries are a way of life. Few fantasy teams
will go through a season without one of their studs getting injured.
Not only will this bring them down to your level, you can use it to
affirmatively improve your team. For example, in 1998, Brad Johnson
(then with Minnesota) was a good pick at quarterback. When his owner
learned he had suffered his annual mortal injury, imagine his dismay
to learn another owner already nabbed Randall Cunningham. Same situation
occurred last year, without the injury, with Cunningham and George.
In fact, it happens all the time. Keep up-to-date on players who,
for whatever reason, are playing more, producing more. Your team can
go from bad to good to great by being on the cutting edge of free
agent pickups. And you will earn the respect (if not hatred) of your
fellow owners if you can consistently turn their misfortunes to your
benefit by being alert.
4. When trading, prepare to "overpay",
but deal from surplus: At first blush, you may think you do not
have anything anyone else would want in order to trade at all. On
draft day this is probably true, and I would recommend that you not
try any trades on draft day, unless you are the beneficiary of a free
will gift. It is on draft day that owners are most in love with their
teams and have no objective, on-the-field performances to dampen their
enthusiasm. If you succeed in trading at all, you are likely to be
fleeced. However, by following the above steps, your Week 2 or 3 team
will be a different story, as will theirs. Believe it or not, you
can obtain position surplus and parley it into starting player quality.
There are emerging players at every postition, not foreseen on draft
day, whom you can grab as free agents. However, nowhere is this more
true than at wide receiver. You can most easily build a quality wide
receiver corps through free agency. Remember the 1996 draft where
I drafted Aaron Hayden as my "top" running back? Well, I read online
that Jimmy Smith was on the rise in Jacksonville, and that this number
3 receiver was cutting into star Andre Rison's time. I read a little
further and learned Jacksonville was thinking of letting Rison go.
I signed Smith, and the rest is history. He became my best receiver.
That enabled me to deal Curtis Conway (early, before he went in the
tank) and another running back for Jerome Bettis. It made my team.
In 1997 I signed Andre Rison and Rod Smith as free agents just as
they were beginning to pay dividends. This gave me an extra receiver,
and I parleyed it, along with Raymont Harris, for Warrick Dunn in
his rookie year. Not an earthshaking trade, but it gave me quality
starters in all skill positions, instead of depth at one and surplus
at another. Obviously, you have little margin for error or injury
with this strategy, but it is made necessary by your poor draft. In
the above trades, I probably overpaid each time, but always from surplus,
trading free agents nobody wanted to draft for players who were drafted
fairly high. Viewed retroactively, you have received extra draft picks
for free.
5. Year-to-year, learn and adapt: It feels
great to turn a loser into a winner over the course of a single season.
However, it gets a little harder to do every year. You will get a
reputation for making shrewd pickups and trades. Owners might be a
little less eager to trade with you. They will become more vigilant
on the free agent market. But, hey, you have a brain, too. Your drafting
skills will get better. You will increase your vigilance on free agents.
But most of all, people will always trade with you if you are an honest
dealer. If you don't lie, but are merely a better negotiator, you
will always have trading partners. The same talent evaluation skills
you use successfully one year will stay with you the next. Take chances
and be aggressive. I have never regretted taking a risk and blowing
it, though I have regretted not taking chances. In addition to all
your analysis, there is always a place for playing a hunch.
Well, there it is -- a poor draft is not the end of the world. Keep
up hope, be aggressive, have fun, and you just might have a winner.
