An Actual Dynasty Fantasy Football Rookie Draft

An Actual Dynasty Fantasy Football Rookie Draft

Results From An Industry Pre-Draft Dynasty Rookie Draft

One of my favorite traditions in dynasty fantasy football is our yearly pre-NFL Draft dynasty fantasy football rookie draft in the DFB Invitational League. The league, started by Scott Barrett from Fantasy Points, features a wide range of fantasy football industry heads. Scott (and teammate TJ Calkins), Rich Hribar, Matthew Berry, Evan Silva, Pat Thorman, Jeff Collins, Danny Kelly, Graham Barfield, Bob Harris, The Seige, myself, and the Dynasty Trades HQ guys are all managers in this league.

In this last week, we wrapped up our rookie draft. As the league has been running since Andrew Luck was still a first-round pick in startups, it is a good look at what can happen in actual money dynasty leagues after picks have been moved around for 5+ years. What follows is the four rounds of our rookie draft and an analysis of where the pockets of value are in a very weird rookie class.

First Round

1. Bijan Robinson - Davis Mattek

2. Bryce Young - The Seige

3. Anthony Richardson - Danny Kelly

4. CJ Stroud - Evan Silva

5. Jaxson Smith-Njigba - Bob Harris

6. Jahmyr Gibbs - Bob Harris

This is how I expect most top-six picks in all dynasty rookie drafts to go, even after the actual NFL draft. There would have to be a huge shake-up in landing spot for another player to leapfrog JSN or Gibbs as the back-end of the elite tier. For example, if Jordan Addison gets selected by the Chiefs or Bills, it is not hard to see him leap-frogging JSN in rookie ADP which is in the realm of possibility.

I think there is an argument to be made for the QBs in any order. I think Richardson has to be ranked as the first QB off the board in SFlex or single-QB, but there is no doubt that Stroud and Young rank as “safer” selections. Richardson’s bust potential is far greater than either of the blue-blood QBs, but his rushing upside makes him the best fantasy QB in the class.

7. Quentin Johnston - Graham Barfield

8. Will Levis - Dynasty Trades HQ

9. Jordan Addison - Pat Thorman

10. Michael Mayer - The Seige

11. Zach Charbonnet - Davis Mattek

12. Zay Flowers - Pat Thorman

I really like the selection of Johnston by Graham. I prefer his archetype of WR to Addison and Flowers, even though Addison or Flowers have lower “bust” potential and higher floors. As the only first-roundish WR who projects to play on the outside, he just has better TD potential than the rest of this group. Levis could be the big value in this group simply because he could turn into a Daniel Jones-esque prospect and be a QB starter for 5+ years. Think of this as the Justin Herbert Corrolary. We were certain Herbert wasn’t that strong of a prospect and he was one of the biggest dynasty value gainers in his class.

I selected Charbonnet as I am turning a tanking dynasty team around into a contender and needed the RB help. I would have greatly preferred to take Mayer (this team I am drafting for has no starting quality TEs) and think he will end up being the value of any player in this rookie class after the top-six guys. What we see here, though, is a huge tier break. After Flowers goes, we enter into a group of 10 or so guys you could make an argument for in any order.

Another thing to note about this draft in particular: several teams have no firsts, and there are others with almost no picks at all in the entire rookie draft. This is the reality of long-running dynasty leagues, so don’t take this as some sort of ADP gospel. It merely indicates where the market is generally before the 2023 NFL Draft.

Second Round

13. Dalton Kincaid - Davis Mattek

14. Jalin Hyatt - The Seige

15. Josh Downs - Danny Kelly

16. Hendon Hooker - Evan Silva

17. Israel Abanikanda - Pat Thorman

18. Sam Laporta - Bob Harris

19. Darnell Washington - Davis Mattek

20. Marvin Mims - Dynasty Trades HQ

21. Devon Achane - Scott Barrett

22. Luke Musgrave - Danny Kelly

23. Cedric Tillman - The Seige

24. Kayshon Boutte - The Seige

Kincaid is a bit of a feel play for me (though I did recently bet Anthony Amico he won’t go in the first round of the NFL draft at plus money). My team needs TE points, and there are several very attractive landing spots for TEs in the top 50 packs. The same goes for my selection of Darnell Washington at the 2.07.

Hyatt and Downs deserve to be the top-end of the second-round WRs. They are both smaller WR prospects (as covered in the first edition of this newsletter) but should get good draft capital. I was quite surprised by Silva’s selection of Hendon Hooker, but in a weak class, finding any sort of starting QB in the second-round is a huge hit for a rebuilding team. Harris’ selection of Laporta is also strong, and he will be a frequent target of mine in rookie drafts this offseason.

Once the draft hits Marvin Mims, we see a gigantic tier break. Given how little information we have on these prospects, we are mostly drafting off of mock draft data, and that data goes haywire after Mims. Cedric Tillman, who CJ took, has been getting plenty of pub because he is one of the few WRs in this class who isn’t built like a baby but is not a particularly strong prospect. The reason so many tight ends went here in this second round is two-fold. First, it is not a strong rookie class compared to the two we just had, and second, it is an above-average TE class. It is very easy to pass on someone like Kendre Miller, who is a very mid RB prospect for the potential of getting a TE who might score 100+ points as a rookie.

Third Round

25. Tyjae Spears - Scott Barrett

26. Kendre Miller - Danny Kelly

27. Rocshon Johnson - Danny Kelly

28. Jonathan Mingo - Evan Silva

29. Trey Palmer - Pat Thorman

30. Xavier Hutchinson - Bob Harris

31. Tucker Kraft - Davis Mattek

32. Zack Kuntz - Pat Thorman

33. Tank Bigsby - Dynasty Trades HQ

34. Tyler Scott - Scott Barrett

35. Sean Tucker - Rich Hribar

36. Dewayne McBride - Davis Mattek

Hit rates for wide receivers decrease dramatically as we get into the back half of rookie drafts. This is both true in the data but also intuitively. Running back production comes from opportunity; wide receiver production comes from skill. It is easier for both NFL teams to identify WR skill and also harder to find. For RBs, we frequently see Day Three NFL draft picks contribute immediately as rookies, even if their teams end up moving on from them. As such, the strategy employed by many managers in this league is to simply throw darts at RBs the later we get in drafts and I think that is 100% correct.

Barrett and Kelly started the round with three straight RBs while myself and Pat Thorman continued to try and find TE points. Team Barrett spent another pick on Tank Bigsby after adding Tyjae Spears. I believe that after the NFL, we will have far more clarity on which of these specific RBs will have a clearer path to fantasy points as a rookie, but for this draft, it is simply a matter of putting shots on goal. Frankly, it was probably bad of me to take Kraft (or Kuntz) instead of Bigsby just based on hit rates. There is not much of a difference in the RBs available here and in round four, however. The one player who could be different is Rocshon Johnson, who I have pegged as the best RB “sleeper” in this class.

Team Barrett and Danny Kelly handled this round and the relevant uncertainties very well.

Fourth Round

37. Deuce Vaughn - Davis Mattek

38. Chase Brown - Pat Thorman

39. Zach Evans - Danny Kelly

40. Evan Hull - Evan Silva

41. AT Perry - Bob Harris

42. Dorian Thompson-Robinson - Bob Harris

43. Rashee Rice - Graham Barfield

44. Jayden Reed - Dynasty Trades HQ

45. Tank Dell - Scott Barrett

46. Kenny McIntosh - Scott Barrett

47. Clayton Tune - Rich Hribar

48. Michael Wilson - Danny Kelly

Look, if Deuce Vaughn makes it, I am going to be rolling the sklansky bucks. His athletic profile is not great, and he is literally the smallest player in the history of the NFL combine. His production at K-State was so great that I couldn’t imagine not taking him in every fourth round of rookie drafts this year.

Thorman, Kelly, Silva, and Barrett continue the theme of mining RBs who might end up in good landing spots. The hit rates for fourth-round rookie picks are so low that it is hard to argue there is even an optimal strategy for using them. Thirty-seven players deep into an NFL class on offense, there probably aren’t very many starters. The RBs taken here will have an easier route to playing time but finding a fantasy starter with what is normally a wasted asset is a huge win.

Tank Dell is a fascinating prospect who, much like Vaughn, is also incredibly small but was hyper-productive at Houston. The Clayton Tune and DTR gambles are indicative of the format; they are unlikely to ever to end up playing, but even one year of Davis Mills-esque production is a huge win.

TL;DR

The 2023 NFL rookie fantasy football draft class is a fairly weak one. We have a strong top-six and four likely starters at quarterback entering the league. That is a huge influx of QB talent taking up 4 of the 32 starting QB jobs and if all four stick for their rookie contracts, these selections will be almost unfairly valuable. After that tier break, it is hard to argue a late-1st this year is likely to turn into a cornerstone of any dynasty roster. Even Addison and Flowers could be new-wave Jalen Reagor’s.

Where the weakness of the class gets exposed is the second round. Generally speaking, seconds in dynasty leagues are undervalued, but there is a good argument for turning your seconds and thirds into veteran contributors this year. That is what I did with my later selections. I tried hard to trade away the 1.11 and the 2.01 for a vet starter but was rebuffed; I also used the 1.08 to trade for Geno Smith and Jared Goff.

You could certainly say “If everyone says the class is bad and is scared, I should be buying” and I wouldn’t tell you to change your mind. One thing we know for certain is that we don’t really know anything about how these guys will perform at the NFL level.

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