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Using ADP to Win Your Fantasy Football Draft

Using ADP to Win Your Fantasy Football Draft

Let’s play a game. Let’s pretend that you are such a dedicated fantasy football manager that you take the time to create your own perfectly-crafted rankings. And let’s also pretend that after all your hard work and research, you have Bilal Powell as your third-ranked running back (I’d say we could pretend Powell was ranked first, but even in make-believe land, you can’t put him ahead of David Johnson or Le’Veon Bell.).

You’re sitting there at the sixth spot in your draft, and there he is. Bilal Powell. Staring you right in the face, the highest ranked player on your board. So you pull the trigger, right?

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No, of course you don’t, or at least, of course you shouldn’t. And you’re certainly not doing it in the second round either. The reason you’re not selecting Powell that early in our lovely little hypothetical is that regardless of how high you rank him, you know you can certainly afford to wait until at least the fourth or fifth round. That’s because Powell has a consensus average draft position (ADP) of 69 (in standard leagues).

Pairing ADP with Rankings

Fantasy managers certainly spend a great deal of time figuring out their rankings. Whether they are creating their own from scratch, relying on one particular source, or, better yet, using the expert consensus rankings (ECR), determining which players we like better than others is perhaps the biggest key to having a successful draft.

But nearly equally as important is understanding ADP and how it can impact your draft strategy. It’s true that often times, the highest ranked players at each position in any rankings you’ll use are close to their ADP (other than in our Bilal Powell example, which again, just a hypothetical, people – do not consider Powell your third-ranked running back!). But as you get deeper into the player pool, that’s when ADP really becomes a critical piece of data to help you win your draft.

For example, let’s take Jamison Crowder, who has a consensus ADP of 86 overall in standard leagues, but has an ECR of 67, ahead of a number of wideouts with an ADP far above him. If you’re sitting there in the middle of the sixth round of your 12-team draft and you need a receiver, Crowder may be the highest-ranked player on your board. But given his ADP, you can likely afford to wait a round before making the selection, and strengthen your roster elsewhere. Your selection of Crowder in the seventh round may still seem like a reach based on ADP, but you know you actually bought yourself an extra pick based on where you have him ranked.

Similarly, you may feel pretty good about the ECR for Matt Ryan of 59, thinking that it’s a steal to be able to get one of the top players from last year in the fifth round. But Ryan has a consensus ADP of 41.2, and will be gone long before you’re preparing to take him. Whether you change your QB plan or simply decide you need to jump earlier for Ryan, having an understanding of ADP as it pertains to your rankings is critical to maximizing value.

Using ADP to Maximize Value

In other words, frequently cross-referencing your rankings with ADP is essential to a well-executed draft. If you look at FantasyPros’ expert consensus rankings, on the right-hand side you’ll see a column for ADP, which shows the player’s consensus ADP based on aggregate value from several sites, as well as a column titled “vs. ADP,” which shows you the difference between the player’s ECR and his ADP. Whether or not you have this page open during your draft (and, in my humble opinion, you should), that’s exactly what you need to be considering.

Also, and this is my usual plug for what I consider the best draft-assistant tool out there, you should be automatically maximizing your ability to consider ADP by using the FantasyPros Draft Assistant. You sync it to your draft, it follows you in real time and gives you expert consensus recommendations as to who you should draft next based on your needs and the rosters of the other teams.

But one of the other great things about Draft Assistant is that you can click on any player’s name and add them to your queue, and it will give you an alert if that player’s ADP suggests he’s a reach. In other words, it does the work of comparing your rankings with ADP for you automatically and tells you when you can almost certainly afford to wait. Or, in our Bilal Powell example, literally disables your draft software to prevent you from making a crazy pick. Fine, not really, but I’ve asked our developers to work on that.

ADP is just one of many pieces of data that you should incorporate into your draft preparation. And if you learn how to appropriately cross-reference it with your rankings during your draft, you can feel confident that you’re maximizing value at all times.


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Dan Harris is a featured writer for FantasyPros. For more from Dan, check out his archive or follow him on Twitter at @danharris80.

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