Best Ball 2021: Rookies + Sophomores Draft Strategy and Tips
A new format has recently cropped up on Underdog Fantasy. It’s Best Ball, but with only rookies and 2nd-year players available to be drafted. With so much uncertainty surrounding the NFL draft, these rookie/sophomore drafts seem to have larger edges available than standard NFL Best Ball, which is already one of the weaker fantasy games out there.
The most obvious initial difference is the condensed player pool and rosters. With just 12 rounds and four picks per round, only 48 players will come off the board in a rookie/sophomore draft. Each week, only your highest scoring QB, RB, 2 WR/TEs, and Flex will count towards your point total.
Much of my personnel Best Ball philosophy reflects the basic principles from what I think is the top-tier Best Ball guide in the industry, written by Scott Barrett from fantasypoints.com. We will need to make tweaks to maximize our edge in this new format, but many of the basic principles Scott discusses in that guide still reign true.
In a vacuum, I believe optimal roster construction in this format to be 2 QB, 3 RB, 7 WR. However, as Scott points out in the Best Ball guide I linked above, the draft capital you allocate to an individual position matters just as much, if not more, than the number of players you draft at the position. If you spend your first three picks on WR/TE, you can likely afford to finish with 6 total WRs since you grabbed higher-premium players at that position with your early picks.
The Sophomore Premium
A quick look at rookie draft ADP shows a massive premium on sophomore players (the highest rookie ADP is 11.0). There are two main reasons why.
The 2021 NFL draft hasn’t happened yet. Sophomore players have a defined role on defined teams and have a much smaller range of outcomes than the yet-to-be-drafted rookie class. Sophomore players also tend to drastically outperform rookies, which is shown here.
While I don’t think it’s worthwhile to do this in the first two rounds, I do believe rookie players are undervalued later on in these drafts. Why? The sophomore premium isn’t about player talent, it’s about certainty over players’ team and roster situations. We can gain a massive roster talent advantage over the field by taking chances on more rookies than the field.
Later on in these drafts, I would much rather take a chance on a player (like Rondale Moore) who at least has a shot at a massive role (in the right situation, obviously), than a player like Van Jefferson, who certainly won’t be a top-2 receiving option on his team. Since Underdog has the added flavor of this being a 2.8k entry tournament, rookie upside should outweigh sophomore certainty in the later rounds no matter your overall draft strategy.
This opportunity presents itself most in the WR market. Carries are a coaching decision. Pass attempts are a coaching decision. Targets are earned. Talented receivers get fed. The biggest edge that exists in these drafts is our ability to get tremendously talented rookie WRs in the back half of these contests.
Zero TE — Except Kyle Pitts
Because TE shares a combo position with WR, its value in this format is massively diminished. TEs score less than WRs in general, run shorter routes, and are less likely to hit big plays. Don’t draft any TEs — except Kyle Pitts.
Pitts is a truly generational talent, enough that it likely doesn’t matter he’s a TE. In half-point PPR (Underdog’s scoring system) last season, just two TEs (Kelce and Waller) cracked the top-32 in WR/TE fantasy points. Pitts is good enough to join them immediately. His elite receiving ability (96.1 PFF receiving grade) and weaker in-line blocking should result in a sizeable number of his snaps coming at WR (much more than your average TE). That means more routes, deeper routes, and hopefully, the 25% target share that comes with being an elite receiving TE.
One Rushing QB to Rule Them All (and a couple of others worth mentioning)
The condensed player pool also brings fewer rushing QBs — arguably the most valuable asset in fantasy. The only rushing QB available who is a lock to start this year is Jalen Hurts. After that, Justin Fields and Trey Lance round out your options.
In drafts full of uncertainty, Hurts rushing floor is arguably the safest asset in these leagues. He should be QB1 and arguably the overall 1.01.
Fields and Lance both offer huge upside at the very modest price tags of QB6 and QB8, respectively. If either player is able to earn their team's starting nod, their fantasy floor will almost certainly be higher game-to-game than nearly all the non-rushing QBs available in these drafts.