Is it Possible to Have a Fantasy Football Team Made up of One NFL Roster?

Fantasy Football – Can you make an entire fantasy roster from one team?

This concept started a few years ago in my work Fantasy Football league where a buddy of mine drafted a lot of Patriots players. The running joke all season was offer him a trade for a Patriots player and he’ll take it. A few years have gone by and we still bring it up every now and then, but then with the trades and free agent signings that happened this off-season, it brought the idea back to my head. Is it possible to have a fantasy team made up entirely of one NFL roster and win?

In order to find out if a NFL team is capable of being a winning fantasy team you first have to figure out what the fantasy team’s roster is. For the sake of this article we are going to go with a quarterback, two running backs, three receivers, a tight end, a flex, a kicker and a defense/special teams. Also I couldn’t decide if I wanted to go PPR or non PPR so I went with half point PPR. The reason I chose to go with three receivers instead of two is because it makes it a lot harder to not only field a winning fantasy team in actual fantasy but also trims the amount of NFL teams that would qualify.

After researching teams rosters and depth charts I have come to the conclusion that it is actually possible to field a winning fantasy team only using one NFL team. I also found out that it wouldn’t be as hard as you would think. I am going to start with the honorable mention teams and work my way through until i get to the winner. Believe it or not, it was a lot harder to pick one winner than you would think.

Fantasy Football: The Honorable Mention Squads

Pittsburgh Steelers:
QB: Ben Roethlisberger
RB: Le’Veon Bell
RB: James Conner
WR: Antonio Brown
WR: Martavis Bryant
WR: Eli Rodgers
TE: Vance McDonald
FLEX: JuJu Smith-Schuster
K: Chris Boswell
D/ST

The Steelers have one of the most high-powered offenses in the league on paper. They have a three-headed monster arguably the best in the league when healthy. There are some glaring problems when it comes to fantasy however – the biggest of which is there aren’t two fantasy worthy running backs on the roster, the only time Bell comes of the field is to rest. You may be able to get away with just using him and taking what you can get from the back-up, who in this case is Conner, but with the other weaknesses it doesn’t make a winning recipe.

Another big weakness of this team is they rarely utilize the tight end. This may be because they never had a tight end worth featuring more than a couple of targets since Heath Miller retired. That may change after they traded for Vance McDonald, who flashed a lot of promise in San Francisco when he was able to play. The final weakness is that the targets are dominated by Brown, Bell and Bryant making it hard for a third receiver to surface. Bell seems to take a lot of the targets that other teams throw to their slot receiver. For these reasons it was almost impossible to pick a flex from this roster, it was the fourth receiver that will only see the field if one of the receivers goes down in front if or spelling a tired Bryant after running a go route. More often than not you will get a zero from the flex spot and you can’t afford that and win a championship.

Fantasy Football: Big Time Passing Attacks

Atlanta Falcons

QB: Matt Ryan
RB: Devonta Freeman
RB: Tevin Coleman
WR: Julio Jones
WR: Mohamad Sanu
WR: Taylor Gabriel
TE: Austin Hooper
FLEX: Justin Hardy
K: Matt Bryant
D/ST

It’s easy to see how Atlanta made the list, they made it all the way to the Super Bowl last year before an epic collapse. They remain mostly intact from last years number one offense. However, even with being one of the most talented offenses it was still hard to find a full roster’s worth of skill position players. The posses one of the most potent running games in the league and a high-powered air attack led by one of the best in the game in Julio Jones. Even with that the third wide receiver and the flex plays are dart throws at best. If you are counting on them as starters in your line up you are hoping for a long touchdown, and those are hard to predict and few and far between. It is to boom or bust to count on to lead you to a championship.

New York Giants
QB: Eli Manning
RB: Paul Perkins
RB: Shane Vereen
WR: Odell Beckham Jr.
WR: Brandon Marshall
WR: Sterling Shepard
TE: Evan Engram
FLEX: Orleans Darkwa 
K: Aldrick Rosas
D/ST

The Giants have one of the best skill positions in the league, the problem isn’t the skill positions though the problem is the consistency at the quarterback position. Odell Beckham is as good as they come, and the Giants made a point at surrounding him with other play makers. The addition of Brandon Marshall this off season is an upgrade from Victor Cruz last year, although Marshall is clearly on the tail end of his career. Evan Engram is basically a receiver in a tight ends body, and just adds another player to cover to open things up on offense. The passing game in New York is going to be a lot of fun to watch, the running game however is a different story. It is very uninspiring and full of unproven players. The best player for fantasy in their back field is their third down/pass catching specialist, Shane Vereen. Running back is a very important part of a fantasy team and with the running game unsettled and unreliable it knocks the Giants out of contention.

Fantasy Football Draft: Are the Packers the way to go?

Green Bay Packers

QB: Aaron Rodgers
RB: Ty Montgomery
RB: Jamaal Williams
WR: Jordy Nelson
WR: Davante Adams
WR: Randall Cobb
TE: Martellus Bennett
FLEX: Aaron Ripkowski 
K: Mason Crosby
D/ST

It’s hard to go wrong with the best quarterback in the league who is also as consistent as they come. The receivers are arguable the best trio in the league from top to bottom. Running backs have been a bit of a weak spot for this team in the past few seasons, but now that Ty Montgomery has a full year under his belt, he has received praise throughout preseason and has earned the starting spot. Rookie Jamaal Williams is close on his heels however and has shown could be a capable fill in this preseason. That’s the biggest problem however, how will the running game play out this year with a converted receiver and a rookie in the backfield. Also Tight end has rarely been utilized in the passing game, but that is a product of who they had playing that position.

The addition of Martellus Bennett in free agency was huge, but what will it mean for the rest of the team? How will they work in a tight end into the offense and will it work? And lastly the flex position is strictly dependent on vulturing a touchdown to have any relevance what so ever. This is one of the best teams in the NFL and should still be alive at the end of January fighting for a Super Bowl birth as long as they can stay healthy. But, as far as fantasy is concerned there are too many question marks to count on.

Fantasy Football: Seahawks Stack?

Seattle Seahawks
QB: Russell Wilson
RB: Eddie Lacy
RB: Thomas Rawls
WR: Doug Baldwin
WR: Paul Richardson 
WR: Tyler Lockett 
TE: Jimmy Graham
FLEX: C.J. Prosise
K: Blair Walsh
D/ST

This was one of the closest teams to actually being a team capable of being fantasy relevant. From top to bottom they have fantasy relevant players, with the exception of wide receiver. The problem with this team isn’t their talent, it’s that their defense is so good they don’t need to score points in order to win games so volume week in and week out isn’t consistent. They have the talent to score with the best of them but most weeks they don’t need to. Also behind Doug Baldwin, the receivers are mostly boom or bust. Paul Richardson is unproven and Tyler Lockett is coming off a major injury with no guarantee that he will return to pre injury form.

The other problem is that the running back position seems to be a true committee approach or riding the hot hand so there will be some games where one or more players is left out of the game plan. This roster has enough power to be a play-off caliber offense, and maybe win you a championship in the right week, but it may also lose you the game if they get in a defensive slug fest.

Fantasy Football – And the Winner Is…

New England Patriots
QB: Tom Brady
RB: Mike Gillislee
RB: James White
WR: Brandin Cooks
WR: Chris Hogan
WR: Danny Amendola
TE: Rob Gronkowski
FLEX: Rex Burkhead 
K: Stephen Gostkowski
D/ST

Surprise, surprise the Patriots have won again. Is there anything that this team can’t Win? The answer to that is probably no, and that includes a fantasy championship. This roster from top to  bottom is the deepest of any team in the league, and the most surprising thing is they just won a Super Bowl and appear better on paper this year than last year. Let’s start with Tom Brady, who may be the best quarterback in NFL history, he is also as solid as they come as far as fantasy is concerned. Next is Rob Gronkowski, who may go down as the best tight end in NFL history, if he can stay healthy this year I don’t see how anyone can stop the Patriots. They also signed a capable backup in Dwayne Allen during the offseason. The weakest position is running back, but they have so much depth that it is plug and play with anyone on the roster. Last year, the offense showed something that it hasn’t shown in recent years, that is predictability in the running game. I think that carries over to this year allowing for multiple backs to be fantasy relevant. Gillislee is locked into the early down and short yardage roll and James White appears to be the pass catching specialist. Rex Burkhead can spell either of them, which may make him the most valuable asset in the backfield.

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Lastly we address the receivers which got a huge boost in free agency with Brandin Cooks. They did however suffer a huge loss in loosing Jullian Edelman for the year with a torn ACL. They have depth at receiver and Chris Hogan and Danny Amendola are more than capable of filling the void left by Edelman. Also the Patriots traded for Phillip Dorsett to add another weapon in the passing game. Tome Brady is the best quarterback to distribute the ball to any or all of these weapons. The only knock on the team is there may be too many mouths too feed, which can make it a nightmare to predict for fantasy. It would still be hard to make a championship run with just this roster, but this is your best chance to do it.

Conclusion
Turns out my friend had a good idea a few years ago, but just failed to execute. Now it may be possible to field a fantasy team entirely of one NFL roster and win it would be very hard to do in Fantasy. It would take a lot of luck for players to drop to you and/or reaching for players. For all the players you couldn’t get on your roster in the draft you would have to trade for and I just don’t see that being possible. I don’t think its a coincidence that the best NFL teams are the teams that turned out on this list, which gave me an interesting perspective for fantasy football. Maybe NFL and fantasy aren’t as different as we think they are, especially in todays NFL. I would really love to try this one year and see how far you can actually get and if you can actually win a fantasy championship. However, as fun as it sounds to compose a fantasy team of nothing but Patriot’s players, I think I will stick to the traditional tried and true method of fantasy football.

Next: Fantasy Football Draft Guide

Best of luck in your Fantasy Football Draft and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR as we get you set for the NFL and Fantasy Football season!