Monty Phan breaks down the key tactics and explains the most important picks in 2023 dynasty startups.

Last year, a friend and I did a RotoViz TriFlex Superflex startup league together on FFPC. We won the league.

So, of course, because past performance is indicative of future results, we confidently signed up for another (even higher-entry) startup again in July, to try to extend that streak to two.

For the uninitiated, the TriFlex format differs from the traditional FFPC superflex leagues by requiring three starting wide receivers (instead of two), adding a third flex spot and eliminating the kicker and team defense positions. The added emphasis on WR value has made it my favorite dynasty format right now.

Normally, I let the early part of the startup draft play out before committing to a specific strategy, but, because of the higher buy-in, we decided that a win-now approach was most appealing. The short version of how our draft unfolded is this: We eschewed a traditional approach – an early focus on drafting high-powered quarterbacks, the most valuable assets in dynasty superflex – and instead faded that position, as well as tight end, loading up early on WR and running back. It’s the evolution of deciding on that approach that’s outlined here.

It helped that we drew the third pick – the last 30 days of FFPC TriFlex ADP data suggested it would be either Josh Allen or Jalen Hurts – because it meant a very good chance we could trade down, a key part of any successful startup draft.

Of course, doing so would go against the blueprint that Bjorn Yang-Vaernet laid out in May in his approach to the perfect startup draft, especially when it comes to QB value:^[1]The bar chart below is from Bjorn’s write-up.

Between 2016 and 2017, 50% of players drafted were top-12 players two years later. This rate dropped to 33% in both the 2018 and 2019 startup drafts. In 2020, 67% of QBs held their top-12 ranking after two years. Given the relatively mediocre QB draft classes in the last three years, I’d expect this rate to hold.

Deciding to trade away the chance to draft a years-long foundational player like Allen or Hurts – especially without having to pay the price of moving up – is decidedly risky, but, when my friend and I drafted our league-winning team last year, we drew the 1.03 then and traded down as well. ^[2]We would have had our choice of anyone but Patrick Mahomes or Allen, but we dropped three spots to draft Joe Burrow at the 1.06, a key to our championship-winning roster. Of course, completing a trade that netted out at least slightly in our favor would mitigate that risk.

The First Thing You Have to Do In Any Startup . . .