ASK THE EXPERTS appears weekly from training camp through the Super Bowl with answers to a new question being posted Thursday morning. How the guest experts responded when we asked them: What is your best piece of general advice for fantasy drafts?
SAM HENDRICKS
Draft who you want. I will say that again it is so simple but often forgotten. Draft your guys. Pick players you want. ADP be damned. Of course as always I will caveat this with......Don't be a homer. Don't be a hater. Don't reach too much. Use tiers and discriminators. But when it comes time to pull the trigger on a pick... if you have serious doubts they will be available with your next pick then pick them. Do not settle for the player with the better ADP or ranking if you prefer someone else. Own it. Draft a team of players you want and ride it.
Hendricks is the author of Fantasy Football Guidebook, Fantasy Football Tips and Fantasy Football Basics, all available at ExtraPointPress.com, at all major bookstores, and at Amazon and BN.com. He is a 30-year fantasy football veteran who participated in the National Fantasy Football Championship (NFFC) and finished 7th and 16th overall in the 2008 and 2009 Fantasy Football Players Championship (FFPC). He won the Fantasy Index Open in 2013 and 2018.
JASON WOOD
Be flexible. The biggest mistake we see mad each year is drafters counting on a few key players and getting derailed if/when those players don’t fall to them. Get comfortable with the tiers at each position and view groups of players in the same tier as interchangeable.
Wood is Senior Editor at Footballguys.com and has been with the company since its start in 2000. For more than 20 years, Footballguys has provided rankings, projections, and analysis to help fantasy managers dominate their leagues.
IAN ALLAN
In the second half of your draft, be sure to throw a few darts at the better backup running back prospects -- Brian Robinson, Zach Charonnet, Ollie Gordon, Blake Corum, Tyler Allgeier. Injuries do occur, so some of those guys at least at times will be big-time players.
Allan co-founded Fantasy Football Index in 1987. He is a member of the FSGA Fantasy Sports Hall of Fame and the Fantasy Sports Writers Association Hall of Fame.
TOM KESSENICH
Draft YOUR team. I see too many players focusing on what other people are doing in their drafts. Yes you want to be conscious of what positions are being taken because that will impact how you build your roster but your main emphasis should always be on building your team, not worrying about what anyone else is doing in your draft. If you spend your time worrying about what others are doing in your draft you've already lost your league. Build your best team. Then go attack the others in your league when the season begins.
Kessenich is the Director of High Stakes Contests for SportsHub Games. He runs the NFFC, NFBC and NFBKC and is a fantasy sports Hall of Fame inductee.
HOWARD BENDER
Stop sweating so much over your first-round pick. Take the player you want, where you want. If you have the third pick and want CeeDee Lamb because you're a Cowboys fan then take him. If you went to Boise State and want to draft Ashton Jeanty with the seventh pick, go right ahead. It's not about who you take in the first round. It's about how you build your team afterwards. I'm not saying be a goofball and take a kicker in the first round, but if you find rankings you like and trust, anyone from the top 12-15 can be rationalized as a first-rounder. Just build your team properly afterwards. Drafts are not won or lost in the first round. The final product determines your fantasy future.
Bender is a longtime veteran of the fantasy sports industry and the 2008 runner-up for People Magazine's Sexiest Man Alive. He serves as the Head of Content for FantasyAlarm.com, a weekly columnist for the New York Post and is the host of the award-winning Fantasy Alarm Show on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (M-F 6-8pm ET). You can find him on X, IG and Facebook as @rotobuzzguy and on TikTok as @therealrotobuzzguy.
KEN HOLIZNA
Don't treat every draft like it's the same. Each league is a whole different animal with its own scoring, roster spots, and weird quirks. What appears to be a steal in one league could be a total bust in another and vice versa. Forget those generic rankings and ADP – they're helpful as a starting point, but they’re not the gospel. Your league's rules are the ultimate guide. Do a bunch of mock drafts – even the auto ones are good practice! Pay close attention to your league's scoring and roster rules in these mocks. This will give you a feel for when players are typically snagged. Try to figure out what you think a player is worth, and compare that to what your draft tools and the mocks say. Sometimes you'll love a player so much you'll overvalue them. Mock drafts can help you avoid that trap and ensure you get good value. It's all about seeing how other GMs value players. If you really, really want someone, maybe you snag them a round early, but don't go crazy and reach 2 or 3 rounds too early. You don't have to be a draft genius on every pick. Pick your spots carefully, and your chances of winning will go way up. Good drafting my fellow fantasy football fanatics!
Holizna is a 29-year fantasy football enthusiast and founder of Faith-Family-Fantasy Football in 2019, a family-friendly, faith-based, G-rated fantasy football platform. Rankings contributor to the 2023 Fantasy Index magazine. Find him on Twitter @holihandicapper
MIKE NAZAREK
Be sure to check ADP online to get a general feel for when your targeted players are going in your fantasy draft.
Nazarek is the CEO of Fantasy Football Mastermind Inc, celebrating 30 years online! His company offers a preseason draft guide, customizable cheat sheets, a multi-use fantasy drafting program including auction values, weekly in-season newsletters, injury reports and free NFL news (updated daily) at its website, www.ffmastermind.com. He has been playing fantasy football since 1988 and is a four-peat champion of the SI.com Experts Fantasy League, a nationally published writer in several fantasy magazines and a former columnist for SI.com. He's also won $40K in recent seasons of the FFPC High Stakes Main Event. Nazarek can be reached via email at miken@ffmastermind.com.
SCOTT PIANOWSKI
Try to remain flexible at the draft table. You want to acquire as much value as you can, and you can often balance your roster later in the season. It's okay to have a plan going in, but sketch it in pencil. You want to be ready to take advantage of the surprise opportunities that presents themselves in the heat of battle.
Pianowski has been with Yahoo Sports since 2008, covering a variety of sports. On the rare occasions when the computer is turned off, he enjoys word games, poker, music, film, game theory, and a variety of condiments. He lives in suburban Detroit. Pianowski was inducted into the FSWA Hall of Fame in 2021.
SCOTT SACHS
Some things I recommend for first-timers or many-timers: Make sure you know the rules of the league. What is the format (redraft, auction, dynasty, best ball), plus how are players chosen (snake, linear, other)? Knowing the scoring rules are essential, too: TD only, PPR 1 point or half point, how much are passing and rushing TDs worth? Team defense, team defense/special teams, or IDP? Waiver wire -- free, bidding, based on won/loss record? Also important is how many weeks are in regular season, and how many teams make the playoffs. If a cash league, strongly suggest teams pay in advance of the draft. If using an online app, make sure you take the time to fill up the queue in advance of the draft start time. Happy drafting!
With 2 perfect seasons and multiple league championships to his credit, Sachs runs Perfect Season Fantasy Football, featuring LIVE Talk & Text Advice. He is a 3-time winner of the Fantasy Index Experts Auction League, as well as a previous winner of the Fantasy Index Experts Poll. Follow on X: a href="https://x.com/ffbcoach" target=_new>https://x.com/ffbcoach
ANDY RICHARDSON
Always make sure you've got a Plan B. Sometimes as my pick is approaching I'm confident such and such player will be there. But if he surprisingly gets taken right before, you need to be ready with your alternative -- you don't want to be flustered or unprepared because something you weren't expecting transpired. Also, ADP is an important tool to research but not the end-all and be-all. How people drafted a week or two ago doesn't necessarily mean they're drafting that way right now, and especially not the other people in your draft room. Use it as a guide, absolutely, but don't rely on it so much you miss out on a player you really want.
Richardson has been a contributing writer and editor to the Fantasy Football Index magazine and www.fantasyindex.com since 2002. His responsibilities include team defense and IDP projections and various site features, and he has run the magazine's annual experts draft and auction leagues since their inception. He writes a weekly gambling newsletter, Index Bets, during the NFL season and also previews all the games on Saturdays and writes a wrap-up column on Mondays.