When it comes to bestball leagues, every little edge adds up. If you’re a mass bestball drafter like me (100-plus leagues), we use these drafts to gain a pulse on ADP as it shifts throughout the offseason and to bring in some additional cheddar on the side. One of the easiest things you can do help put yourself in position for a profitable bestball season is by using roster construction to your advantage.
While there are some differences site to site, we’ll go over the ideal way to build a 20-man roster using one of the more popular sites, Fanball. The former “MFL10’s” have been officially turned into “Bestball10’s” following their acquisition by Fanball and remains one of the most popular sites for bestball drafting. These leagues have 20-player rosters with the goal being to score the most amount of points from Weeks 1-16. Let’s get right into it.
Quarterbacks (2-3)
Ideally, we’re looking for two or three quarterbacks in this format. If taking a top-six option at the position, I’d recommend waiting late to get your QB2 and load up at the other positions. You can also opt to wait on the quarterback position for quite a while and grab three quarterbacks in the later rounds. The flat scoring of quarterbacks makes this an easy position to wait on if you prefer the Late Round Quarterback method. Last year, Jameis Winston (14.05%), Blake Bortles (10.74%), and Mitchell Trubisky (9.92%) all went later than QB20 yet posted top-10 win rates. The bestball format takes the highest score of your “Frankenstein QB” position, making this a viable option to approach the quarterback position.
One of my favorite strategies is to get a backend top-12 QB (Carson Wentz, Kirk Cousins) and pair them with a rushing quarterback (Cam Newton, Dak Prescott). When the stoic quarterbacks have an off game, the intent is for the rushing quarterback to have a high enough floor that you can get by with adequate scoring. Rushing quarterbacks make for strong candidates in this scoring format given the high floors and ceilings they possess. When both the rushing and passing games click, they can provide some of the highest scoring weeks.
Running Backs (5-7)
The running back position is a tough one to fade early. The top-five highest scoring positional players last year (0.5 PPR) were running backs. The workhorse backs are just as important in bestball leagues as they are in the typical redraft format. Starting with at least one running back in the first two rounds (and drafting five RBs total) gave an average win rate of 9.0%. Considering the average win rate of one of these leagues is 1-in-12 (8.3%), it’s imperative that we take advantage of every edge in order to come out on top with a winning portfolio.
However, going too far with an RB-heavy start can be detrimental to the overall scoring of your squad. Starting with four-straight running back selections last year yielded an average win rate of just 2.4%, per a study by RotoViz.
The number of backs you need should directly correspond to how much draft capital you invest in the position. Spend early and often at the position, five will suffice. If you spread out your running back selections and find yourself without any workhorse backs, six to seven rotational backs should be your target, hoping one of them is elevated to workhorse duty.
Outside of prioritizing every-down workhorse backs, a tertiary target of ours should be drafting backs on high-scoring offenses. Touchdown variance remains one of the least predictable year-over-year statistics, but by selecting backs on teams that routinely finish near the top of the league in scoring, we put ourselves in a great situation for six-point bonuses from our running backs.
The number of backs you select should be fluid in nature, with you willing to adapt to how your draft is played out. Pay attention to the number of backs you select as you go round-by-round, and don’t be afraid to reach a little over ADP to get the guys you want.
Wide Receivers (7-9)
The volatile nature of receivers seeing high-performing weeks makes this our most-drafted position. Targets remain the lifeblood of fantasy scoring, but week-to-week consistency starts to wane quickly as we get beyond the first few rounds in the draft. Given that we start three wideouts (with the ability to flex a fourth), having a surplus of receivers is beneficial to us putting out our highest possible score.
The boom/bust nature of some vertical wide receivers can be tough to rely on in typical redraft leagues (see Ted Ginn Jr., DeSean Jackson). However, in bestball leagues, we get the benefit of dismissing the bust weeks while counting the massive performances to our weekly scores. Draft a few of these types of players, and you have the potential to have rotating big weeks whenever they go for long gains and/or a touchdown. These types of players with high ceilings make for ideal late-round picks.
Tight Ends (2-3)
The tight end position is another volatile one that mostly comes down to touchdown scoring. Outside the top tier of tight ends, high weekly scores for this position come down to reaching the end zone over pure volume. Drafting three tight ends helps increase that touchdown probability if you miss out on the Tier 1 group that gets by with outrageous target volume (Travis Kelce, Zach Ertz, and George Kittle). Rookies rarely produce at the tight end position in Year 1, so I’d recommend going light on your shares of T.J. Hockenson and Noah Fant and instead pivot to known producers at similar ADP like Jordan Reed or Mark Andrews.
DSTs (2-3)
Like the tight end position, this group needs touchdowns to provide any massive swings in fantasy scoring. DST touchdown scoring is one of the least predictable things for us to measure year-over-year, so we can get by with volume (drafting three DSTs) and looking at units that have a high propensity for sacks and turnovers. The top-scoring DSTs rarely repeat the same finish the following year, so instead of taking one early in Round 15, continue to stockpile receivers on good offenses and wait until your final three rounds to address the position.
