It’s early August, perhaps the ideal time of the year to draft most of your best ball teams. There are a lot of rankings and strategies out there, but the best advice is the players to take. Every pick, every round, must be carefully thought out to maximize your team’s potential throughout the regular season and smash in the crucial Week 17 that separates the champions.
For this exercise, I will use aggregate Best Ball ADP provided by FantasyPros and will cover 20 rounds of 12.
Round 1
Best Pick: Amon-Ra St. Brown (DET). For the most part, just follow your rankings, but Amon-Ra falls just behind Breece and Bijan. WRs still dominate the first round of best ball, and Amon-Ra is a value even at two-pick separation.
Round 2
Marvin Harrison Jr (ARI). Sometimes, it’s not even available in Rd2. Harrison’s value catapults for Puka Nacua owners, as a Week-17 game stack can be completed with two of the best WRs at the 1-2 turn in what could be the highest-scoring game of best ball championships.
Round 3
Brandon Aiyuk (SF). This pick didn’t used to be possible, but Aiyuk’s best ball ADP has been slipping since he demanded a trade. Aiyuk has no leverage and will remain a top receiving option for the best team in the NFC.
Round 4
Trey McBride (ARI). Another tool to capitalize on the most lucrative Wk17 game, McBride offers legitimate TE1 overall upside without the prices of Kelce or LaPorta.
Round 5
Christian Kirk (JAX). Undisputed WR1 on what should be an ascending Jacksonville offense. Kirk could go a round earlier and still be a good pick.
Round 6
Evan Engram (JAX). The last TE before a significant dropoff in talent at the position. Engram is going to absolutely eat and if you haven’t drafted a TE yet, he’s perfect and easy to complete stacks with.
Round 7
D’Andre Swift (CHI). If going zero- or hero-RB, this is around the time you can look for your 1st or 2nd running back, and Swift is an explosive pass-catcher on an untested Chicago offense led by the best rookie QB prospect in a long time.
Round 8
Jaylen Warren (PIT). The pessimism against Pickens is the reason for Warren’s optimism. Both Najee Harris and Warren will have a big role on a run-first team. Warren has standalone value as well as contingent upside, and his quarterback(s) will give him a lot of looks.
Round 9
Javonte Williams (DEN). Another hero/zero candidate to start filling out the RB room. Yes, there are questions about this backfield, but there isn’t good reason to speculate that the 24-year-old 2nd-round pick is on the chopping block. If ownership parts ways with him, nobody can be held accountable for that bad of team management.
Round 10
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Trey Benson (ARI). This is a bet that Benson could eat into, if not eventually outpace, teammate James Conner, who has never stayed healthy through a full season. It’s also a bet on the offense as a whole, which should be up in pace with a full season of Murray.
Round 11
Zach Charbonnet (SEA). Teammate Kenneth Walker isn’t gassed and has the big play potential, but the distance between Seattle’s complementary running backs is too great, especially with a new coaching staff that may upend our idea of this team’s rushing game plan.
Round 12
Ty Chandler (MIN). Green Bay may have made a mistake parting ways with playmaker Aaron Jones, but no team knows him better, and they chose to leave the oft-injured running back to free agency. Chandler has ousted Mattison, and climbed to the top, but is still being treated like a replacement back.
Round 13
Luke Musgrave (GB). Musgrave’s ADP is getting a bit of a bump with news of teammate Tucker Kraft’s injury, but that’s not the reason he’s on the list. Both Musgrave and Kraft had already had a rookie impact on an ascending Jordan Love team. The ceiling is high, and the TE battle is far from over.
Round 14
Will Levis (TEN). It is crucial to get a top QB this year. Barring that, fantasy managers have to compile high-potential dart throws to eke out meaningful best ball games. Levis won’t have an elite ceiling, but he’s going to smash ADP in best-ball-friendly big-game potential as the Titans are completely revamping to become a pass-centric team.
Round 15
Noah Fant (SEA). Capitalizing on early TE is even more important than early QB this year, which makes it insanely difficult, as most drafters are biting on runs and soaking up tight ends in early rounds. Fant is a freak athlete with potential whose career has thus far been hampered by the softest QB play of any TE of his class. A turnaround could finally come.
Round 16
Isaiah Likely (BAL). Likely is talented enough to earn targets without an Andrews injury. This team has limited targets to spare, but they are extremely valuable and Likely an injury away from being an every-week starter in best ball and redraft.
Round 17
Drake Maye (NE). He has the potential to be complete dust, but there is no QB left in the draft with his rushing upside. Maye gets it done on the ground, and the Patriots will only last so long before they force their rookie to play some meaningful reps.
Round 18
Clyde Edwards-Helaire (KC). If you have drafted extremely WR-heavy to this point, you may look for a last-ditch effort at RB, and you can’t do worse than a Chiefs RB with a contingent upside. He has been thoroughly pushed down the depth chart, but sharps know that RBs primarily score via opportunity, not talent.
Round 19
Dawson Knox (BUF). Knox has been sidelined almost to an unfair degree. Yes, Kincaid is a mouthwatering target, but Knox isn’t far removed from targets, fantasy potential, or Josh Allen’s love. Save Isaiah Likely; there is probably no TE with a greater contingent upside than Knox.
Round 20
Michael Mayer (LV). A year ago he was one of the most coveted rookie TEs. What happened? The Raiders bit early on another rookie TE, but in no way does that diminish the player or athlete Mayer is. QB concern will be there, but the book hasn’t been written for this sophomore.
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