The Draft Strategy That Will Win You Your League

Don't draft as many pitchers early on.

Don’t draft a pitcher until the middle rounds of the draft.

That’s both the tip of the iceberg and one of the key tenets of this draft stragey, which will help you win your fantasy league this year.

By and large, this strategy should put you in a strong position to not only win your head-to-head leagues but win each matchup each week. Stack enough weekly wins or draws and you’ll easily be in the playoffs at season’s end.

The reasoning for not drafting a pitcher until later is threefold.

Hitters Early

One is, that by focusing on hitters early, you give yourself an elite lineup that can win most or all of the hitter category stats (average or on-base percentage, home runs, stolen bases, RBI and runs scored) each week. Win four or five of those each week and you just have to split the pitcher stats (wins or quality starts, ERA, WHIP, strikeouts and saves) and you’ve got a win each week.

Realistically, waiting until the ninth, or even 12th round to draft a pitcher can pay massive dividends in filling out the bulk of an elite lineup of hitters.

The second part of the reasoning here is that there are plenty of potential quality (also impact) fantasy pitchers who should be available later in the draft.

Drafting Pitching A Bit Later

Each year injuries (from past years) drop pitchers further down draft boards than their talent and effectiveness would indicate. Of course, gambling on injuries is not a surefire thing and comes with some risk, but it’s also an excellent way of finding value later in drafts.

Sandy Alcantara, Spencer Strider, Shane McClanahan, Brandon Woodruff and Drew Rassmussen are all pitchers with ADPs south of the 117 mark this year, per NFBC data as of January 14. Take McClanahan out of the mix and each of those pitchers has an ADP after 140.

However, it isn’t just about injured pitchers. There are plenty of quality starting pitchers who you can find later in drafts (more on that, as well as the relievers to consider in this draft strategy a bit later on).

Waivers?

Yes, the waiver wire. The other key bit here is, in fact, the waiver wire.

Because for as much as quality pitchers are available later in drafts, some aren’t drafted entirely.

Obviously, it’s not part of the draft, but it’s a place where it’s immensely easier to find starting pitcher help, whether that pitching help is merely good or above-average.

Here’s a list of above-average fantasy pitchers who you probably found on waivers at some point last year:

Garrett Crochet, Shane Baz, Jared Jones, Jack Flaherty, Paul Skenes, Seth Lugo, Michael Wacha, Reynaldo Lopez, Ronel Blanco, Cristopher Sanchez, Sean Manaea, Spencer Schwellenbach, Bowden Francis, Spencer Arrighetti, Reese Olson, Nick Martinez. I can keep going.

Here are the above-average fantasy hitters (by the end of the year) who you may have run across on waivers at some point last year.

• Brent Rooker.

• Lawrence Butler.

• Colton Cowser.

Maybe Jordan Westburg if someone in your league undervalued him.

Am I missing anyone? … checks notes… depending on how you value him, Victor Robles maybe?

Either way, it’s a much shorter list and a much more difficult task to find quality fantasy hitters via waivers.

The nature of starting rotations (and that each real-life team has five starters at a time) opens up more possibilities considerably.

It also allows you to mix and match with pitching production to supplement your team.

Take Zack Wheeler’s production for example.

Wheeler is routinely drafted among the top starters in fantasy each year, and for good reason. He’s one of the game’s elite starters with an ERA below 3.00 in four of the last five seasons and a FIP that has risen above the 3.20 mark just once since 2018. During his Major League career, the veteran has topped also topped 180 innings six times, including in three of the last four seasons.

Ok, you get it. He’s good.

He’s also ranked at #41 in my redraft rankings.

His ADP, per NFBC data is 21.12.

Last year in total, Wheeler produced these statistical totals:

• 200 IP

• 16 pitcher wins (26 quality starts)

• 224 strikeouts

• 52 walks allowed (2.34 per nine innings)

• 57 earned runs allowed (2.57 ERA)

Let’s for a moment switch back to all those undervalued fantasy starters you probably saw on waivers at some point last year.

Let’s pick Reynaldo Lopez and Reese Olson out of that group.

If you combine both pitchers’ numbers, you’d end up with this cumulative stat line.

• 248 IP

• 12 pitcher wins (23 quality starts)

• 249 strikeouts

• 72 walks allowed (2.6 per nine innings)

• 74 earned runs allowed (2.69 ERA)

Here’s the breakdown of the cumulative stats side by side:

Lopez (155.13 ADP) and Olson (276.95 ADP) are, by the way, reasonably undervalued heading into next season as well, for what it’s worth.

All in all, you should be able to find quality pitching later in drafts and at various points in the season that can help you log solid weekly pitching stat totals without having to draft starting pitchers early.

Pitching Volume

At any rate, waiting on pitchers can provide excellent results, particularly with the right mix of said pitchers and general innings volume in general.

That last word is the key bit here.

Because with that elite lineup in place that should win you most hitting categories each week, you really only need to claim a couple of pitching categories to win each week.

Given the right volume of pitcher innings, you should be able to do that and then some.

Overwhelming your opponent with innings should not only guarantee you the pitcher wins and strikeout categories most weeks, but it also insulates statistically against an out-of-the-blue blow-up by a starter that can tank your team’s ERA and WHIP totals for the week. Furthermore, more often than not, it should put you in a decent position for the WHIP category as well.

The strategy also lessens the need to focus on relievers earlier in drafts and lets you be advantageous with picking up backup closers, or emerging closers via waivers during the season (though this strategy does include drafting closers. More on that later).

(As an aside, if you’re in a saves+holds league, I’d consider not drafting a reliever at all, filling any reliever starting spots with starters with reliever eligibility and then adding free agent relievers off of waivers later. In leagues with FAAB budgets, I wouldn’t allocate any on a reliever waiver claim either.)

So let’s see…

That’s the elite part of the lineup covered. Check.

The pitching thought process and volume portion of the strategy. Check.

And the note about relievers. Check.

Oh yeah, want to see the strategy in action?

Here’s a look at it with this year’s ADP (all via NFBC) data from multiple positions in the draft.

For this exercise, we’ll be looking at the strategy through the lens of drafting 12^th in a standard, 12-team, head-to-head league with 5x5 scoring* and a starting (position player) lineup that consists of a catcher, a first baseman, a second baseman, a shortstop, a third baseman, three outfielders and a utility player.

There’ll be other paid subscriber exclusive columns looking at other draft positions in the coming days and weeks to help get you ready for draft season, but for now, we’ll start with those drafting with the 12^th overall pick, doing a deep dive on an entire draft’s worth of selections for that draft slot.

*This stragey works whether your league uses average or on-base percentage as part of the scoring.