2014 Fantasy Football Draft Part I

How are you going to win your fantasy football pool this year? That is certainly a good question. No guarantees exist in fantasy football. One of the things you can do is try and have the best draft possible. I have won two championships in a row in an IDP standard league. What was the key to my success?  Who I drafted and when I drafted them. The most important element of the draft is drafting players when they slide down in draft position. I believe in drafting players who offer more value than their peers.

To find my approach to the 2014 fantasy football draft I first analyze last year’s numbers. It is important to analyze the numbers to understand how to group players, and to see the distribution of points at the various positions.  

The easiest way to display this principle is by examining the top 12 quarterbacks. I base my calculations off groupings of twelve due to being in a twelve team league.  I also do calculations based off the top 6 at a position. It is also a good idea to group players into tiers, but we will get to that later. The average of the top twelve quarterbacks from last year came to 366, the top six came to 399. By those calculations Stafford, Dalton, Brees and Manning were the truly exceptional quarterbacks. Peyton Manning was the most valuable fantasy football player last season.  He exceeded the average of the top 12 quarterbacks by 131 points.  Peyton Manning provided production that far exceeded his peers.

Player	FFPts
Peyton Manning	496.8
Drew Brees	437.5
Andy Dalton	377.1
Matthew Stafford	367.8
Cam Newton	359.7
Philip Rivers	359.1
Andrew Luck	345.2
Ben Roethlisberger	341
Matt Ryan	335.3
Russell Wilson	331.8
Ryan Tannehill	321.5
Colin Kaepernick	320

Here is a list of players who greatly exceeded their positional top 12 average.

Name	Points
Peyton Manning	130.73
Jimmy Graham	86.24167
Jamaal Charles	84.48333
Drew Brees	71.43
LeSean McCoy	53.08333
Matt Forte	37.68333
Vernon Davis	31.74167
Josh Gordon	26.275
Demaryius Thomas	25.875
Calvin Johnson	19.775
Julius Thomas	19.54167
Marshawn Lynch	13.68333
Andy Dalton	11.033

Although Peyton Manning was the best fantasy player of 2013, I am still trying to decide where I will draft him in 2014. The reason being the amount of quarterbacks I start in my league. I can only start one running back a week, while I have to start two running backs, and three receivers.   Over the next few days I will be participating in mock drafts to attempt to find out the best draft strategy from the 12^th spot. The 12^th spot is where I will be drafting in one of my leagues, so it will be beneficial research for me and hopefully for you readers!  I will also have general draft tips, and lot of information pertaining to the 2014 fantasy football draft.