We had our fourth Fantasy Alarm Best Ball draft on RealTime Fantasy Sports last night, so let’s take a look at what went down. We returned to the normal snake draft format for this one after having the auction draft previously. I will breakdown what caught my eye and how I feel about a few teams. The draft board can be found below.

General Thoughts

Welp, this draft started in a rough way. My phone was being blown up and I was dealing with that and I didn’t get an alert when my first pick came up… and that meant also missing my second pick. On the bright side, I planned on drafting Kenyan Drake , and he didn’t make it to me anyways. The only change that would have happened would be that I would have taken Derrick Henry over Austin Ekeler , but it is what it is. From there I continued to target my backs, and let me tell you, tenth pick is an awful slot this year. You miss out on the Tier-1 backs. Then, (at least in this one) all the Tier-3 backs were gone too (Leonard Fournette , Chris Carson , Le’Veon Bell, Clyde Edwards-Helaire, Todd Gurley ). Don’t get me wrong, I like Devin Singletary , David Montgomery , and Kareem Hunt , but they aren’t overly exciting me for a best ball league. I don’t mind my tight ends and wide receivers, but they aren’t overly exciting either. I was able to mix it up and get my first draft shares of Hunter Renfrow and Laviska Shenault, both of which I like. Overall, this team is very “blah/meh” and I probably won’t win.

The voices of Twitter really liked Howard’s team, and I can’t argue with that. I will say drafting only five backs is a bit risky, especially when Dalvin Cook is talking about holding out, but as long as Cook plays his team will be in good shape. He’s strong at every position, but his backfield is thin, and any amount of time missed by Cook or Chubb could be the nail in the coffin. I also like Scott’s team, despite being lower on Kenny Golladay and Amari Cooper than most. I feel like it’s got some nice balance and it is strong everywhere except tight end. If Gronk is anything like Gronk of old, Scott will have a really tough team to beat. He made running back and wide receiver positions of strength and still landed an elite fantasy quarterback in Dak Prescott (though I personally prefer Murray over Prescott slightly).

I think this is the first draft where no team really stands out as my least favorite. Most teams have a few picks I like and don’t like. I guess if I had to choose, it would be Voytko’s, simply because I am not in love with that type of draft strategy. However, he did a pretty solid job of making his strategy work. He’s really strong at wide receiver, and if his backs hit, he will do just fine. I do feel as though only going five running backs is risky, especially when one of them is Derrius Guice , who is injured more often than he is healthy. I really do believe any of the teams in this league could finish in the top five; everyone did a solid job.

While no team really stands out as my least favorite, there are plenty of picks that I don’t like. Sony Michel early in the fifth round is a pick that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. Michel is a terrible player, and fantasy player and his value just dropped even further with the Pats signing Cam Newton (another goal line threat). There were a lot of backs on the board that I would take over him. It seems like Miles Sanders is going earlier and earlier in every draft I do, and I am starting to wonder if he will be a top-five pick soon. It still makes no sense to me, based on what we have seen from Doug Pederson.  Lastly, I think Howard made a poor choice gambling on waiting so long to grab Alexander Mattison. How important is a pick like Marvin Jones (when you already have Odell Beckham , Mike Evans , and D.K. Metcalf) to your team when Cook’s threats of holding out are serious. It could easily work out, but it could bite him in the rear end big time.

Key Notes

  • Through our first three drafts, 70-percent of the teams had selected at least two defenses. Pretty close in line with this draft, with eight of the ten teams selecting two defenses.
  • Through our first three drafts, 43-percent of the teams had selected at least two kickers. This draft saw six teams go with two kickers, so that was a bit higher of a rate than what we had seen to this point. 
  • Through our first three drafts, 33-percent of the teams had selected at least three quarterbacks. In this draft only two teams selected three quarterbacks, so a bit of a drop off. The people of this draft chose to grab an extra kicker over a third quarterback, it appears. I do like that Hollis went with three quarterbacks, based on the choice to wait on them and take lower tier guys.
  • Through our first three drafts, 33-percent of the teams had also chosen to select at least three tight ends. With only two teams going with three tight ends in this one, we again see a slight drop off in comparison to what we had been seeing. I waited on tight end in this draft and wanted to give myself a bit more upside at the position, so I went with three. I feel like I selected three guys with talent, but I don’t see any of them being consistent. Hopefully, that won’t matter for this best ball format though.

I don’t love this roster, and I certainly like it a whole lot less than the team I drafted in the previous draft, but overall I think it is okay. We plan on doing plenty more of these, so if you want to get in on the action, follow me on Twitter @JustinVreeland and send a DM my way. I look forward to seeing more of you!