Best Ball has become one of the most popular fantasy football formats in recent years. There are several reasons for this. While everyone seemingly likes to participate in drafts, not everybody enjoys managing a team once the season begins. Scanning the waiver wire, making FAAB claims, and dealing with ridiculous trade requests can become too much to bear. Not to mention dissecting weekly matchups and schemes or keeping up with injury news in order to maximize your lineup. But Best Ball takes away most of that tedious work. Best Ball leagues automatically optimize your lineup each week. Did your RB5 outproduce your RB2 again? Not a problem! Whoever scores the most points at each position will be inserted into your starting lineup each week. You simply draft and collect your prize money free and clear in January. What a novel concept. Your Best Ball Draft Strategy will look a little different than that of a typical fantasy football league.
Drafting in Best Ball leagues requires some flexibility from a drafting perspective. On a personal note, I like that Best Ball forces me to value players and draft differently than I do in other formats. Embracing diversity and variety should help you identify players and trends that you may have missed otherwise. Here are a few things that I think fantasy managers should keep in mind before drafting in Best Ball leagues. I am going to tailor most of these tips and tricks towards Fantrax Best Ball leagues. Having said that, they should also be applicable to most Best Ball formats.
2024 Best Ball Draft Strategy
No Risk It, No Biscuit
When it comes to drafting, I am usually the proverbial grumpy old man telling kids to get off my lawn. I generally do not overreact to training camp noise, including but not limited to “best shape of his life” narratives. I will happily take the boring veteran over the hyped rookie in most traditional leagues. And I will usually gravitate towards the player with a consistent floor over one with high weekly volatility. However, that is not the way you want to draft in a Best Ball league. We want to draft for upside, not consistency. For example, I am lower on Anthony Richardson in Redraft leagues than most of my colleagues. But I will gladly take the Colts quarterback in Best Ball leagues.
Richardson’s ceiling is incredibly high if he can remain healthy. While injury risk may deter me from overpaying in standard formats, Best Ball makes it worth the risk. Richardson averaged 18.4 fantasy points per game last season. Even that number underestimates his impact when on the field. That is because Richardson left multiple games early due to injury. The dynamic quarterback only averaged 43.3 snaps per game last year. Patrick Mahomes also averaged 18.4 fantasy points per game last season. However, it took him 65.7 snaps per game to do so. Fantasy managers are drafting Richardson fifth or sixth among quarterbacks in Best Ball leagues, compared to sixth or seventh in other formats. His Best Ball ADP feels much more appropriate to me given the balance between his upside and his potential for injury.
This same mindset holds true for other positions as well. I am also the lowest on Jahmyr Gibbs among our think tank. Gibbs only scored 10 or more fantasy points (half-PPR scoring) in seven of 15 games last season. Meanwhile, Rachaad White scored 10 or more fantasy points in 12 of 17. If you want to give me the “it just took Jahmyr a while to get going” argument, fine. Except that beginning in Week 7, Gibbs scored in double figures in seven of 11 games. White did so in 11 of 12, including 10 straight. Gibbs has a reputation for being a PPR darling. But he had 52 receptions for 316 yards last season. Ezekiel Elliott (who looked washed two years ago) had 51 receptions for 313 yards.
Because of that, even with a little more consistency this year baked in, I am not in love with the idea of drafting Gibbs in the first round in most formats. But give me Gibbs in the first round of a Best Ball league and I’ll be a happy camper. That is because Gibbs comes with elite upside. Gibbs had five games with 22 or more fantasy points last season in half-PPR formats. White had one. Bijan Robinson, Derrick Henry, James Cook, and Joe Mixon each had two. De’Von Achane is another running back who fits this mold. He played in 11 games last season. Achane scored 21 or more fantasy points five times, but also scored in single digits five times. Pass catchers who I like more in Best Ball formats include George Pickens, Christian Watson, Jameson Williams, Kyle Pitts, and T.J. Hockenson.
Draft Depth
There are 20 rounds in Fantrax Best Ball leagues, with nine starting spots each week. The starters include one quarterback, two running backs, three wide receivers, one tight end, one Flex, and one D/ST. And yes, I would draft a second D/ST. I understand the argument against it, but I try to avoid taking a zero at all costs if possible. If you draft a second D/ST, you then have 18 spots to fill up the other four position groups. In most formats, you can draft a stud quarterback and call it a day. The same can also be said about the tight end position. If someone goes down, you can always grab a replacement off the waiver wire. However, this is not an option in Best Ball formats. There is no waiver wire, nor FAAB, nor trades to be made. What you draft is what you get.
The number of quarterbacks and tight ends you draft may depend on circumstances. Patrick Mahomes has played 95 of 99 games for the Kansas City Chiefs since 2018. That includes multiple games where the team rested him in the final week of the season. If you draft Mahomes, it might make sense to only draft one more quarterback. However, if you draft Anthony Richardson or Joe Burrow, you may want to draft a third signal caller. I have a similar mindset when it comes to tight ends, albeit for a slightly different reason. A tight end’s weekly ceiling is relatively low compared to players at other positions. Only 15 tight ends averaged more than seven fantasy points per game last year. Taking a zero sucks. But a third tight end may not help you as much as an additional option at a premium position.
Even if you drafted three quarterbacks, three tight ends and two D/ST, that leaves 12 spots for running backs and wide receivers. Again, this number can be as high as 14 if you only draft two entities at those three positions. I do not have a specific RB-WR split that I religiously stick to since every draft is different. However, generally speaking, you want to have at least one backup for every “starter” that you draft. That means a minimum of four running backs and six wide receivers. Since your Flex spot is almost always going to be filled by a running back or wide receiver, I would add an extra option to each group. So, if I am drafting a total of 12 running backs and wide receivers, I usually gravitate towards a 5-7 split. If I go with 13, I prefer to go 5-8.
Stacks
Stacking is the practice of drafting teammates from the same NFL team. This is most commonly done with a quarterback and a pass catcher. The theory behind stacking is that you need fewer outcomes to come to fruition to boost point production. If Patrick Mahomes throws a 20-yard touchdown to Travis Kelce, Mahomes gets five fantasy points and Kelce gets nine. If you have both Mahomes and Kelce on your roster, you get all 14 fantasy points from a single play. I believe that many fantasy managers go a bit overboard with stacking in redraft formats. However, I love utilizing this practice in Best Ball leagues. If you draft two quarterbacks, you should try to stack one or both with a pass catcher from the same team. The trick is not to force it in either direction.
Elite pass catchers are being drafted before any quarterbacks are off the board. Even most high-end pass catchers are gone before low-end QB1s are in 12-team leagues. If you draft Justin Jefferson in the first round or Malik Nabers in the third, you certainly do not have to force Sam Darnold or Daniel Jones onto your roster. Similarly, if you draft Lamar Jackson early, you do not need to reach for Rashod Bateman. I like to think of stacking players as a tiebreaker of sorts. If you have drafted Dak Prescott and need a wide receiver in the 12th round, maybe you select Brandin Cooks instead of Mike Williams if you do not have a strong lean one way or another.
I see a very intriguing stacking opportunity developing in Buffalo. Josh Allen is the consensus QB1 despite the loss of Stefon Diggs. Sure, some of Allen’s value is based on his rushing production. But the Bills quarterback has thrown for over 4,000 yards in four straight years and has thrown at least 35 touchdown passes in three of four. Someone (very likely more than one player) is going to soak up that production. And while tight end Dalton Kincaid is valued as a fifth-round pick, none of Buffalo’s wideouts are being drafted within the top 100 overall picks. Keon Coleman’s ADP is in the ninth round, while Curtis Samuel and Khalil Shakir usually go in Round 10. I really like the idea of pairing Allen with at least one of his wide receivers. This is a cheap way to stack one of the NFL’s best offenses.
Bye Weeks and Matchups
For any position in which you only draft two players, you should be aware of bye weeks. You want to avoid taking a zero at all reasonable costs. If Joe Burrow is your QB1, do not draft Kirk Cousins, Trevor Lawrence, or Aaron Rodgers as your QB2 unless you plan on drafting a third. If Dallas is your top D/ST, do not draft Chicago. I am less concerned with bye weeks for running backs and wide receivers. Just make sure that you have enough options each week to get by. If you draft five running backs, ideally you would have no more than two with the same bye week. This way, you will have two starters and one for a potential Flex spot. If you have eight wide receivers, you will be fine as long as no more than four have the same week off.
A lot of fantasy managers try to take matchups into account when playing the bye week game. For example, someone who drafts C.J. Stroud (Week 14 bye) may be inclined to look for a second quarterback who has an easy Week 14 matchup. The problem with this strategy is that the NFL changes so much from year to year. It is difficult to say with any certainty what will constitute an easy matchup four months from now. If you have Stroud and decide to draft Jared Goff over Caleb Williams as your QB2, it should be because you genuinely believe Goff will have more spike weeks. Not because he has a better Week 14 matchup than Williams does. Draft the best players and let the fantasy football gods take care of the rest.
Got a different take on Best Ball Draft Strategy? Drop some knowledge in the comments below and then make sure to check out our 2024 Fantasy Football Draft Kit for more great rankings and analysis.