NFL DRAFT DFS: All You Need to Know About Best Ball Drafts (DRAFT.com)

Why do you need another DFS site? Because DRAFT combines the excitement of a season-long draft into one set of games! Available from now until the start of the NFL season are “Best Ball” drafts. If you have seen them in the lobby and have not tried them out yet, this article will help prepare you!

Welcome to this first of two installments of NFL DRAFT DFS, covering best ball drafts on DRAFT.com from FantasyCPR. My plan here today will be to explain to you exactly what a “Best Ball” draft is and how it works. In the next couple of days following the publishing of this piece. I will put out my top 216 rankings. Yup it sounds like a lot, but for a 12-man draft, this is how deep you will need to go. We will talk more about this later, when we breakdown some examples of drafts I have completed thus far. I will also touch on some basic roster construction options as well.

I play quite a bit on DRAFT, and have always been a big fan of the snake draft format. They offer 3-man, 6-man, 10-man, and 12-man best ball drafts, that start upon filling. In the DRAFT lobby, you will find me mostly in the 6-man and 12-man best ball drafts. The DRAFT app can be downloaded to your mobile device through your app store, or you can access their desktop site here.

Introduction to Best Ball Drafts:

So the first question I asked was of course was “what does best ball mean?” I know what it means for golf and golf tournaments, but is it the same principle? Not at all. What best ball really means here to put it as easy as possible, is that this is a one time thing. There is no setting of lineups every week. There are no waivers. If one of your guys gets injured, there is no injured reserved. One chance to do your best right now with 18 roster spots. So what is the benefit you ask? Well for draft junkies like me who like to hammer out a mock draft a couple times a day, this is a great way to fine tune your skills for your season-long drafts, while still making some money if your teams can stay healthy.

Types of Best Ball Drafts:

There are two types of best ball drafts available in the lobby. Fast drafts are quick in the sense that they are similar to your everyday drafts on DRAFT, and you get 30 seconds to make each pick. Slow drafts are quite a bit different. I am in the midst of my first one. It started just over 48 hours ago and we are at pick 4.12. I am not sure what to make of it quite yet.  I am sitting with A. Brown, McKinnon, Cooks, and Thielen at this point, which is a fantastic start in my opinion. It’s just too slow for me.

The fast drafts have been pretty solid though, and I like the teams that we can put together in this format. Let’s proceed and check out the rules and scoring a bit more in depth. Of course DRAFT has done a great job with this as well, and all of their info on best ball drafts can be found here.

Rules and Scoring for Best Ball Drafts:

So the rules are simple. Select your draft style when you are all ready to go and draft your squad. We have 18 roster spots for QB, RB, WR, and TE. There are no kickers or defenses on DRAFT. The common strategy for most with those 18 picks is to draft three QB’s and TE’s, and six RB’s and WR’s. While this is a good strategy, and should be able to cover an injury at each spot, I am not quite married to it. For me, it will depend a lot on how my draft shapes up, and where I may need that extra spot.

Scoring:

Scoring is tallied every week from weeks 1-16, and prizes will be distributed accordingly after the season. Instead of having to keep tabs on these teams every week like you would with an ordinary season-long league, best balls on DRAFT do all of that for you. This is especially awesome, because scoring for the weeks are as follows. 1-QB, 2-RB’s, 3 WR, 1-TE, and 1-FLEX will accumulate a weekly score, and your top scorers at each position’s points will count.

So out of your 18 guys drafted, only 8 particular players scores will count to your total each week. The flex spot can not be a QB, so you will only receive points from one QB per week. It will be either your third highest RB, fourth highest WR, or 2nd tight end. As far as the scoring goes, it is fairly basic with a .5 PPR. A full look at the scoring can be found here.

Now that you have a basic idea of what a best ball draft is and how they work, let’s check out the results of my first two fast drafts. I will break down a couple of my picks at each position to help you out along the way. Also remember to keep an eye out in the next few days for my overall rankings!

 Breakdowns of Best Ball Drafts:

Above are my first two drafts of the season. I was really happy with my first round picks in both drafts. In my first draft, I had the fifth pick, where I selected Larry Johnson. In the second, I scored Rams breakout RB Todd Gurley. Johnson of course has some question marks returning from an ACL, but I was sure to grab his projected back-up in the late rounds. Handcuffing, as it is known, looks to be essential in my opinion for these drafts with no waivers or trades. Be sure to find a current team RB depth chart if you have any questions regarding who is next in line, should your stud RB get injured.

Quarterbacks:

As you can see by my results. QB is not really a position of priority per se, but we don’t want to wait too long to grab a couple quality starters in this format. Remember you only get the top score per week, and there are only 32 NFL starting quarterbacks, so four QB’s drafted will be starting the season in a back-up role at the very best.

On my second team with Patrick Mahomes and Jared Goff, one thing should stick out as to why I drafted four QB’s on that team. Remember to pay attention to your bye weeks! Both of my top two QB’s here have a bye in week 12, so I will be forced into waiting to see if Baker Mayfield or Josh Rosen is starting by then.

Running Backs:

If you are in a league with a flex position, it could turn out to be very beneficial to draft three running backs with your first three picks as I did above. However, it could also make the rest of your team suffer. What you will notice, is that I drafted seven running backs total. If there is any doubt about any of my players I draft finishing the season, I like to grab an extra at that particular position.

I also mentioned handcuffing briefly above. Grabbing Johnson’s back-up at the end of your drafts could be huge. The Cardinals spent the 134th pick in last years draft to draft Fordham RB Chase Edmonds as insurance to Johnson. He could quite possibly turn out to be the most important handcuff in deep leagues like this.

You will also notice I stubbornly took Detroit Lions rookie running back Kerryon Johnson in the sixth round of the second draft. A second round pick out of Auburn, all signs point to Johnson as being a great back in the NFL, but the Lions have not produced one of those in years. I felt like veteran LeGarrette Blount will vulture some TD’s in a goal-line role, and still has a few good games left in the tank. It is a crowded backfield though. Theo Riddick will still get third down snaps, and Ameer Abdullah is still in the fold as well.

Wide Receivers:

My zero WR team is really hurting at this position. In fact, it is pretty much awful. Josh Gordon is a huge question mark, but he is so incredibly good that he is worth the risk at pick 4.8. Pairing him with new teammate Jarvis Landry, and also drafting their potential starting QB Tyrod Taylor, I am very vested in Cleveland Browns which just doesn’t seem smart. I guess we will see.

Titans staple Rishard Matthews offers good value for where he is being selected. As does new Dolphins and former Chiefs WR Albert Wilson, and Atlanta veteran Mohamed Sanu. I grabbed Sanu in the 12th round of my second draft, after just missing him in my first. It’s really a tough position after Antonio Brown this year, and I am focusing a bit on the Vikings duo of Adam Thielen and Stefan Diggs. Both wideouts should thrive with addition of Kirk Cousins. Another stud I like is Brandin Cooks, who joins Jared Goff and the Los Angeles Rams.

Tight Ends:

Depending on my draft position, I am in favor of drafting Travis Kelce or Rob Gronkowski late 2nd / early 3rd round. On my team with Gurley who was the 2nd overall pick, I was able to land Kelce at 2.11, and follow that up with Thielen at 3.2. That team looks promising. Jay Ajayi is expected to handle a bigger load this year and Cooks, who I mentioned above, gives that team as good a shot as any.

I have yet to go three deep at this position, as I have felt comfortable with what I had drafted. Jimmy Graham should excel in Green Bay if he and Aaron Rodgers can stay healthy, but drafting Colts touchdown machine Jack Doyle as well on my first team made me comfortable using that last pick on that fourth QB. I felt that was necessary due to my bye week blunder.

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That will be all for this how-to guide for NFL best ball drafts on DRAFT. If you have any questions, give me a follow on Twitter at @JuanBondDFS. You can also leave a question right here in the comments, and I will do my best to respond. Remember to keep an eye out for my NFL best ball DRAFT rankings, which should be ready in a couple more days. I plan to get at least 10 drafts in to get sufficient rankings. If you try one of these after reading this and/or my rankings article, let me know! I would love to hear about it!