Welcome to fantasy football draft season, everyone. For veteran players, fantasy drafts are a breeze. However, first-time players can understandably feel overwhelmed heading into their fantasy draft. Yet, fantasy players have nothing to worry about, as I have four tips to help you prepare for your draft, even as a first-time player.
- Fantasy Football Draft Kit
- 2025 Fantasy Football Expert Rankings
- Fantasy Football ADP
- Fantasy Football Trade Tools
Tips to Best Prepare for Your Fantasy Football Draft
Understand the Rules
It sounds silly, but knowing your draft rules is the first thing fantasy players must do before drafting. You don’t want to show up on the wrong day for your draft, or think you have plenty of time between picks when there are only 30 seconds per pick.
Fantasy players want to approach a slow draft differently from a fast-paced one. Slower drafts allow for more in-the-moment decision-making and potentially trade deals. Meanwhile, a fast-paced draft means fantasy players should know who they are drafting before they are on the clock.
Furthermore, fantasy players must know the scoring and lineup format well before the draft. You will have a different strategy if your league had only one starting quarterback versus a superflex spot. Similarly, you will want to target wide receivers over running backs in a PPR-scoring league.
Moreover, landing Brock Bowers or Trey McBride is far more valuable in a tight end premium scoring league. The two superstars are the only tight ends who should have over 100 receptions this season, making them significantly more valuable in tight end premium scoring drafts.
Do Your Homework
Hopefully, your first time playing fantasy football isn’t in a league with 11 random people you found on the internet. The best way to play fantasy football is with friends, family, or co-workers. It’s always more fun to play with people you know, especially because trash-talking is a critical part of the game.
However, that’s not the main reason you want them in your fantasy football league; it’s so you can gather intel. You want to see which players your league mates like, dislike, and think are overvalued or undervalued, whether it’s in the group text chain or around the water cooler.
More importantly, do some research. Ideally, fantasy players can spend countless hours building an in-depth set of rankings. However, that likely isn’t the case for first-time players. Therefore, fantasy players should use the FantasyPros Expert Consensus Rankings when drafting. Furthermore, consume as much fantasy football content as possible, whether reading articles or listening to podcasts.
While fantasy players can find endless research, they should have their own opinions, too. Fantasy players should have a list of at least three values and three sleepers they want to grab during their draft. The values are players you feel are getting drafted later than they should. Meanwhile, sleepers are double-digit round players you believe have significant or league-winning upside.
Get Your Fantasy Football Hardware
Draft day isn’t just a kickoff—it’s a statement. Show up with a massive draft board, custom gear, and your sights set on the trophy. Spreadsheets? Whiteboards? Save those for budget meetings. This is fantasy football, and TrophySmack is how real leagues draft.
Honor the Commish. Etch the champ into history. Lock in the hardware before the first pick. From 6lb belts to custom rings and draft-day chains, TrophySmack turns your league into a legacy.
Determine Your Draft Plan
Some fantasy players like to enter their draft with a set game plan or draft strategy, while others like to wing it. Don’t be the latter, as winging it or deciding on the fly is a foolproof way to hate the team you draft and miss the playoffs.
Yet, that doesn’t mean you must determine your draft strategy before the draft starts and pigeonhole certain players or positions at specific picks. Fantasy players want to let the draft come to them and never reach for a player, even if it’s at a position they still need to fill.
Instead, fantasy players want to look at their league lineup, bench, and scoring system to determine a rough game plan. For example, it’s more important to prioritize wide receivers early if your league has three starting wide receivers and a flex spot in a PPR scoring league.
Furthermore, fantasy players want to gauge whether or not they want to draft an elite tight end, quarterback, both, or neither. I want to leave every draft with either Brock Bowers or Trey McBride. However, I’m less likely to draft one of the superstar tight ends in the second round if I have to start three wide receivers instead of two.
Practice! Practice! Practice!
Practice makes perfect, right? You wouldn’t take the most important test of your life without taking at least a few practice tests, so why not do the same thing with your fantasy football drafts? Furthermore, everyone loves doing mock drafts, especially when using the FantasyPros Mock Draft Simulator.
While doing mock drafts is fun, fantasy players need to treat them like the real deal. Furthermore, fantasy players don’t want to use the same strategy over and over again. Instead, do a mock draft using the Hero-RB strategy while punting on the tight end position.
Then, try a Robust-WR strategy while targeting a high-end tight end or quarterback and wait until the middle rounds to select your first running back. Focus more on the build and which strategy you like best based on your league’s settings. Don’t get caught up too much in which players you land in the mock drafts.
Instead, focus on the team builds and where on the draft board you like a batch of running backs, wide receivers, or tight ends. You can’t predict how every pick will go during your draft. Furthermore, fantasy players will get sniped at least once, if not more, during the draft, especially if you are playing with people you know.
Subscribe: YouTube | Spotify | Apple Podcasts | iHeart | Castbox | Amazon Music | Podcast Addict | TuneIn
Mike Fanelli is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Mike, check out his archive and follow him @Mike_NFL2.