If you play Dynasty Fantasy Football, you have committed yourself to playing Fantasy Football year-round. The time, effort, energy, and intensity of Fantasy Football come in waves but the off-season is crucial for your team. The off-season allows you to take time to form an action plan and shape your roster so it can stand up in the heat of battle when the season comes. The off-season determines future success in your league. I have always emphasized “Playing 2 Win“, and for Dynasty Fantasy Football that means a combination of strategy and activity in the off-season.
This article will walk you through some strategies when it comes to addressing your Dynasty Fantasy Football roster this off-season. Content is often very player-focused for Fantasy Football, and there is not enough content focused on strategy, which is just as important as being able to identify “good” and “bad” Fantasy Football pieces. Through these strategy notes, I hope you walk away with actionable advice that will benefit you moving forward in your league(s).
Fantasy Football in the Playoffs?
Not ready to be done with fantasy football? You don’t have to be! Create a league with The Fantrax Playoff Commissioner and keep the fun going all the way to the big game!
Dynasty Fantasy Football: Off-Season Roster Strategy
Reflect on 2023
I always think it is important to reflect on the 2023 season. Who did what? Who lived up to expectations? Who was a “bust”? Who were the biggest surprises? Then from your reflection questions, take a look at WHY. Many factors go into the “why”, or the reasons behind player performances in a given season. Those variables can include role changes, high or lack of efficiency, injuries, opportunity, offensive schemes, teammate play, and many other factors.
2023 P2W Data:
Fantasy Points Per Touch
150+ touch RB's
Who stands out? pic.twitter.com/5mvoOfqygI
— Nick Skrip (@P2WFantasy) January 17, 2024
As a content creator, it has been important for me to create videos, articles, data drops, infographics, and more to cover what happened in a given season. You as a Fantasy manager may watch games every weekend, but there are oftentimes we are so consumed by what our own specific team’s players are doing that we do not pay attention as much to players across the board. I try to push out weekly notes during the season to help managers catch what they may have missed
Week 16 Fantasy Football Notes
To know if you are playing in the Week 17 Fantasy Football Championship ⬇️
— Nick Skrip (@P2WFantasy) December 26, 2022
Reflecting on a season can help you evaluate your current roster. Understanding the “why” for player performances on your Fantasy team can guide you in the direction of being actionable with your roster.
Evaluate Your Roster
Following an NFL Season, you will need to take a good look at your roster and evaluate the players on it. Where are you strong positionally? Where do you have good depth? Who are the players you are looking to move on from that you have lost optimism for? Who are the players you feel like you can sell high? Who are the players you want to build your roster around? You should ultimately determine the value of players, but it can be useful to consume content from analysts to compare your values vs. others.
Dynasty Rankings: 1/25/24
– Top 16 + Tiers
– Full rankings updated every single Friday in the Patreon. Link in bio pic.twitter.com/jwUPZGfBa4
— Nick Skrip (@P2WFantasy) January 25, 2024
Evaluate Your Team Direction
After you evaluate your roster, you need to evaluate your team’s direction. Evaluating your team’s direction will help with determining the roster moves you should make to fit that direction. Do you feel your team can compete in 2024? Do you feel you need to continue to build a roster through another season? Are you somewhere in the middle of competing and building? Do you need to just blow up your roster and try to start fresh? Do you need to completely go all-in for 2024? These are the questions you should be asking yourself based on your current roster. Once you determine your team’s direction, it is time to take action that aligns with your team’s direction.
Transactions
When it comes to Fantasy Football transactions, people toss out phrases without explaining what they mean. Here are my definitions:
- Buy Low: Capitzaling on a player’s lowered cost now, which could rise significantly later
- Sell High: Capitalizing on a player’s value being higher now than it will be later by selling at their potential peak
- Pay Up: Making the necessary move to get a player on their team. Trading a fair value, or sometimes overpaying to get that player
- Sell: Moving on and getting what you can for a player
Reflecting on the season, evaluating your roster, and scanning your league for targets will help you take action. Consuming content from trusted analysts can also help with identifying players to target or move off of
Fantrax Fantasy Football: Dynasty Buy Lows via @p2wfantasy https://t.co/jec19U5rMv
— Fantrax (@Fantrax) January 25, 2024
Trade Process
Trading is difficult in Fantasy Football because it is the process of convincing someone else to give you an asset you want through an incentive. Here is a process worth taking:
- Identify your team needs, or players you want to target
- Identify the other team(s) in your league, that can address your team needs or player targets
- Identify the need of that specific team, and how your team can address that need. Or simply identify an incentive for them that would make sense
- Send the initial offer
- Let the other manager know that you sent the offer
- Follow up. Countering phase. Negotiations.
- Either a deal is done, or you move on
This sort of exercise can be different person to person, and league to league based on how the managers operate. I do feel this can be a general guideline you can improvise on. Sending out blank offers, with zero incentive for the other manager to give you what you want, typically leads to unanswered offers or quick denied responses.
Draft Capital
The closer and closer we get to the NFL Draft, the more and more the value of picks will increase. More content will be out there covering the incoming rookie class, and the focus will shift from what happened in 2023 to the shiny new additions of 2024.
I feel that at this time, with football still on TV and people paying attention, you can use players to trade for picks. You can use recent performances at the end of the season, of even in the playoffs, to go and trade for draft capital. A lot of managers still are thinking about this past season, and are still weighing in on their thoughts on players. The further we get from the regular season, and the closer to the draft, that can fade. If you are looking for draft picks, now is a better time to try and trade for them than later.
If you are looking to trade away draft picks, I would suggest waiting for those picks to be at peak value. That typically is somewhere between the NFL Draft, and your rookie draft. Managers get excited about the incoming class and will want to actively be picking on the day of your rookie draft. This often means managers overpaying for draft picks. You can definitely capitalize on that, but the timing is important.
When you are shaping your roster, a lot of managers will focus on either players or draft picks. It is perfectly acceptable to have a balance of both and shape your roster as you need from there. “Rebuilding” your team does not always need to be done through draft picks. “Contending” does not always mean buying veteran players.
Concluding Strategy Thoughts
Activity is key when it comes to Dynasty Fantasy Football. No, you do not have to spend hours per day to build a championship roster for now or in the future. Yes, you do need to continuously evaluate your team, and take action that aligns with the direction your team should go. The process above is not just for the off-season but a process you can take year-round. When you do not need to focus on immediate results, like you would in-season, you can spend your efforts solely on bettering your roster. Now is the time to shape your roster how you like, to be a future Fantasy Football Champion.