Michael Dubner looks at how we can use the Zero RB fantasy football draft strategy in the NFL DRAFT Best Ball Championship tournament.
It’s been nearly six years since RotoViz’s Shawn Siegele penned the ground-breaking article “Zero RB, Antifragility, and the Myth of Value Based Drafting.” Despite the re-emergence of workhorse RBs, Zero RB is still thriving. While Zero RB may be effective in traditional best ball leagues, how effective is this strategy in the NFL DRAFT Best Ball Championship format?
We’ve already explored:
- Onesie position strategies on DRAFT: 1. allocating four roster spots to the positions, 2. six QB/TEs, and 3. the onesie position strategy you can use in every draft.
- The best time of year to draft your tournament teams.
- Wide Receiver values in early DRAFT Best Ball leagues, two of which have climbed over 30 spots in ADP.
Shawn Siegele’s Best Ball Workshop has done an excellent job outlining the best strategies we should look to use as well as the mistakes to avoid in drafts. Now I’m interested in applying these lessons in a way that will improve our chances of taking home the $1 Million first-place prize of the DRAFT Best Ball Championship.
And there’s no better place to start than with the RotoViz staple: Using Zero RB in the NFL DRAFT Best Ball Championship tournament.
Comparing Zero RB on DRAFT versus MFL10
Understanding your league settings is the first thing a winning fantasy football player should focus on. When fantasy football analysts discuss different strategies, it’s always important to note the scoring format they are referencing. Since many analysts discuss Zero RB in the context of full-PPR leagues, such as MFL10, our first exercise here is to compare Zero RB on DRAFT versus MFL10. For this article, I will define “Zero RB” as selecting your RB1 in Round 5 or later.
As you may intuitively expect, Zero RB appears to be more effective on a full-PPR site. However, the average person may find it surprising that Zero RB has the potential to create win rates exceeding 11% on a half-PPR scoring system.
