It’s early August, and this is 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 to take the player’s advice. Every pick, every round, must be carefully thought out to minimize duds and scrub zeros 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
Worst Pick: Bijan Robinson (ATL). Robinson had great value back in May, but now that his ADP has moved up, he’s separated too far from teammate Drake London to complete what could otherwise be the most meaningful stack in all of best ball. If Bijan is somehow at the end of Rd1, then he instantly becomes the best pick paired with London in Rd2.
Round 2
Derrick Henry (BAL). I like Henry, especially for redraft, but there are a ton of holes to poke in a running back with notoriously low receiving volume on a new team with a QB who takes a lot of the groundwork himself.
Round 3
Josh Allen (BUF). He probably is the QB1, but not at the full-round difference between him and Jalen Hurts.
Round 4
George Pickens (PIT). Even toward the end of the round, it’s still not worth it. Pickens is extremely talented, but there’s a potential QB carousel between Fields and Wilson who happen to love dumping off to running backs.
Round 5
CJ Stroud (HOU). An amazing real-life QB and strong MVP contender, Stroud is surrounded by still amazing value at RB, WR, and TE, and is the first pocket QB drafted. The value of pocket QBs isn’t quite so limited in DraftKings best ball formats, which reward 300 pass-yard bonuses, but a QB at this cost needs to be a dual-threat.
Round 6
Jayden Reed (GB). Indeed, we haven’t seen his ceiling yet, but there is no clear answer to the Packers’ receiving room. Drafters are over-confident that he is ahead of Doubs, Watson, and Wicks, all of whom have a legitimate chance to lead the team in snaps.
Round 7
Joe Burrow (CIN). Sandwiched between Kyler Murray and Dak Prescott, Burrow is another pocket QB who, at this ADP, is only an acceptable pick if a drafter already has both Tee and Chase.
Round 8
Brock Purdy (SF). Only acceptable to complete a stack, Purdy is drafted at his ceiling one pick ahead of rookie Jayden Daniels. Purdy is an amazingly efficient passer, but he’s locked into a pocket and has no ground potential.
Round 9
Brock Bowers (LV). He is an amazing rookie prospect, but he’s sharing space with Davante Adams and 2023 2nd-round TE Michael Mayer with a QB carousel in even worse shape than Pittsburgh. Hard pass.
Round 10
Nick Chubb (CLE). Arguably the best pure rusher in the NFL, Chubb’s injury replacements are decent rushers, and it is possible the Browns don’t see a need to return Chubb anything close to his role when he comes back from injury.
Round 11
Brandin Cooks (DAL). The most Cooks have going for him is that he is the (distant) WR2 behind CeeDee Lamb, but this 10-year vet turns 31 in September, and his best days are way behind.
Round 12
TJ Hockenson (MIN). Recency bias is a heck of a drug, but Hockenson’s injury late last year was bad. Hockenson should hopefully be primed for the most important best-ball weeks, but the cost is riding an absolute zero on your bench for most of the season.
Round 13
JK Dobbins (LAC). It’s so painful to see, but Dobbins’ injury history has been brutally debilitating, and now he is failing to compete with 29-year-old Gus Edwards for snaps. He may be done playing meaningful football.
Round 14
Adam Thielen (CAR). An aging WR drowning in a sea of rookies at the same ADP, Thielen is only draftable if owners need to shore up targets, but the nature of the best ball is big-game potential, which Thielen no longer possesses.
Round 15
DeMario Douglas (NE). Honestly not a terrible pick; this round is full of potential, but of any team in this group, the Patriots are poised to score the least points and win the fewest games. Why, when looking for deep potential, would you target anyone from this team?
Round 16
Justin Fields (CHI). Fields has often been a fantasy-friendly QB, even as a terrible real-life QB. However, the real world is catching up, and the team has even indicated this pass-thrower may return kicks. Yikes. He will be zero after zero on your bench, and even this late, best ball teams can rarely advance with a zero.
Round 17
Tyler Boyd (TEN). Boyd had meaningful usage as a Bengal, but even only barely, and never with the big game potential that we strive for in best ball. We have good reason to believe TEN will be more pass-centric, but not at a level to provide Boyd with any opportunity to ascend beyond his past self.
Round 18
Gardner Minshew (LV). We’ve seen him. We haven’t seen as much of Aidan O’Connell. If the Raiders are looking to the future with their new coaching staff, they’re going to go with the rawer person they can mold.
Round 19
Zach Ertz (WAS). 34 years old in November, this once supreme target-earner is, at best, hoping for the number 3 role on a team with limited passing volume. Like Thielen, Ertz relies on absolute targets and cannot hit the favorable big-game thresholds critical for best ball success.
Round 20
Calvin Austin (PIT). An absolute dead zone, but you shouldn’t treat your last pick like a throwaway when there is still potential. Pittsburgh may be the worst throwing room in the NFL, and there is already too much hype on WRs higher up the food chain in this anemic offense.
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