The first overall pick has been
something that I have an amazingly large amount of experience with getting in
my randomly selected fantasy drafts. I get it a lot. I hate it. I hate having
one pick in the first 23. The stress and pressure of who to take, and not
wanting to pick the guy who is going to bust, there's always one, is not
something I want to deal with. But someone has to have the top pick. So let's
take a look at the scenario I used from my mock draft on the fantasypros.com mock draft simulator.
I have put a fair amount of time
into my strategy of who I would take at number one.
I looked at the four usual
suspects and many aspects of their pros and cons in an article I wrote on socalledfantasyexperts.com.
As I discussed in that article, the LeVeon Bell suspension makes me not want to
take him. I don’t like the situation for Jamaal Charles, and Eddie Lacy has a
heck of a tough schedule in my opinion this season. So this left me at Adrian
Peterson. So for the purposes of this mock draft I took Peterson to line up
with my pick.
Now since then I have had a
monumental shift in my thought process on my favorite back this year. I am
willing to take a gamble on a guy that I believe has all of the things I value
for a top running back. With the fifth easiest schedule of run defenses from
last year, a much tougher pass defense schedule, a new regime that likes to run
and uses a bell cow running back, I am willing to gamble on CJ Anderson to be the
top running back for the 2015 season. Give me the first pick in a real draft,
or redoing this mock, and I take him every time.
So now that I’m off my soapbox, we
can resume a look at this mock draft I did. At pick 24 there is surprisingly no
quarterbacks off the board. The best running backs available are Lamar Miller,
Frank Gore, and Andre Ellington. The best wide receivers available are Mike
Evans, DeAndre Hopkins, TY Hilton, and Brandin Cooks. Jimmy Graham and Travis
Kelce are both still available, but this is way too early for me for them. I
have pretty much fallen in love with Mike Evans this year.
His situation is
great.
He has a quarterback that is willing to toss the ball up. He is very
tall. His schedule is extremely favorable for passing. And last but not least,
he was amazing with no talent at the quarterback position last year. I can’t
think of a guy I want more on this board, so Evans is my guy.
Pick 25 in this mock is the spot
that is a little weird for me.
I don’t hate taking Aaron Rodgers or Andrew Luck,
I prefer Luck. If you like Graham and want him, this is your spot, he won’t be
available at the next pick. It is likely that the top 20 running backs and
receivers will be picked clean the next time through, so you need to make your
pick here based on that info. I am a believer that your second running back can
be cobbled together from round four, five, or six picks. So we already have a
top running back and a top receiver on our roster. Because this is a PPR league
I want to take a good volume receiver. I like Brandin Cooks of the receivers
left on the board. Cooks was on pace for a high volume last year, and this year
there are more targets to spread around from missing components from last
season.
At the end of the fourth round we
find that
much to our good fortune Alfred Morris and Latavius Murray have
fallen to us. There is only one Top 20 wide receiver left on the board in
Keenan Allen. Peyton Manning is the best quarterback left, as Luck, Rodgers,
and Russell Wilson are all off the board. Drew Brees is also available in this
spot. I like to stack a quarterback and a receiver, and if we didn’t need some
running backs for this team I would probably take one of the quarterbacks, and
lean toward Brees. But alas, we have found that two of the Top 20 running backs
have fallen to us, so it makes our 48th and 49th overall
picks pretty simple ones. Alfred and Latavius, welcome aboard.
When the end of the sixth round
finds us,
there are now seven quarterbacks off the board. Matt Ryan, Tony Romo,
Eli Manning, and Ryan Tannehill are the best four on the board. Travis Kelce
and Greg Olsen are gone. The best tight end left is Martellus Bennett. At
running back LeGarrette Blount has found his way to this spot in the draft. He
is joined by Rashad Jennings, Shane Vereen, and Joique Bell. At wide receiver
we find Eric Decker, Steve Smith, Anquan Boldin, and Mike Wallace on the board.
I had a very hard time making a
decision at this spot.
I sat with my finger over the mouse ready to click draft
on Blount, but I just couldn’t do it. I hate having Patriots running backs on
my team. I decided to go ahead and select Eric Decker, who I wrote about as a late round sleeper. Decker
is a target of mine in middle rounds, and oddly this week I think his stock
rose with Geno Smith being out and Ryan Fitzpatrick taking over as the starter.
With the 73rd pick I
decided to take a quarterback.
Of the players left I have two players to pick
from. Either I am taking Matt Ryan, or I am taking Eli Manning. I like both of
these players for the 2015 season, in fact writingabout Eli earlier this off season. The
schedules for both teams are good for passing, they won’t face the best of
passing defenses from last year. For me it comes down to preference and the
rest of the situation. The Falcons have two proven wide receivers. Julio Jones and Roddy White are both players
I wrote about this season. They have a history of being great players. The
Giants have Odell Beckham Jr. who was phenomenal last year, but is a second
year guy and not proven yet. Along with Odell we have Victor Cruz who is
returning from a torn patellar tendon. This is not an easy injury to return
from, and even with all reports pointing to good things, nobody knows how Cruz
will play this year. When you consider these factors, Matt Ryan is my guy.
During round seven there was a run
on tight ends.
In round eight a run on running backs goes down. I find the same
wide receivers that were available previously and some tight ends I am not
interested in at this spot in the draft. Time for the trick play that I have
been hearing about on many podcasts and reading about on twitter a lot. Arian
Foster is sitting there. At the end of round eight you should already have a
good slate of starters. Our team here is only missing a tight end, but with the
top 11 off the board, we aren’t in a rush anymore. So Foster is the perfect lottery
ticket at the end of the eighth. With incomplete information about his injury
and the timeline currently, Foster might find himself back by the second week
of the season. If you get him at any point near then for the rest of the
season, you can assume you should be the gold standard of your league.
The next pick is a little more
difficult for me.
I only have three wide receivers on my squad so far. I am usually
a fan of loading up on receivers, but there is still some great running back
talent on the board. Isaiah Crowell is on the board, and if he is the guy who
is starting in Cleveland, it’s a great spot for him. They are a bad team, which
has a great offensive line, and will win by running and playing defense.
Devonta Freeman is still on the board. If he can get healthy and stay that way,
he has the chance to be the starting back in Atlanta. Reggie Bush is on the
board, and as I wrote here, Bush can be a great value play in PPR leagues. I decided
to take Crowell here, gambling that he is eventually going to win this job. I
would be okay with any of these backs, but would take them in the following
order: Crowell, Freeman, Bush as it stands today. With all of the running back
talent I have, if one of the later round guys I drafted hits, or if Foster
comes back quickly, I could trade a running back to upgrade my wide receiver
corps.
As we hit the end of Round 10, we
find a lot of wide receivers on the board.
Since our last pick only one came
off the board. We need a receiver and a tight end. The running backs on the
board don’t make me want to draft them, especially since this team is stocked
well. Kyle Rudolph is going to be our guy here. Minnesota faces the fourth best
schedule for tight ends based on Fantasy points allowed to tight ends. With
Teddy Bridgewater in his second year, and performing well at the end of last
season, if Rudolph can stay healthy, he is set up well for this season.
Our next pick needs to be a wide
receiver. We lack depth there and need to find a value guy with a high ceiling.
I want to take a guy that has a lot of upside. The receivers available are
Steve Smith, Mike Wallace, Charles Johnson, Marques Colston, and Nelson
Agholor. I decided to take Agholor here. If he is ready to play this season,
the volume he will see in the Philadelphia offense will make him a great value
for the 11th round.
We have now found the point in the
draft where I am snatching up my value wide receivers.
I find Pierre Garcon
sitting there at the end of round 12. As I wrote in my late round PPR values article, I
love Garcon this year. If Robert Griffin III can get it together this year, I
think Garcon can be a huge value. If you have been reading the rest of my mock
draft articles, the 11 pick, and the 12 pick, you will notice that I like to
take Garcon late. I’m hitching my wagon to him this year.
I grab John Brown with my pick at
the start of Round 13. I like Brown over Floyd currently seeing as he didn’t
just have surgery to repair a compound dislocation. I like to err on the side
of the guy who has skills and didn’t just have hand surgery.
I take Stephen Gostkowski and the
Ravens defense in rounds 14 and round 15. I took the top kicker and the
defenses were decimated by the time I made my pick. I would likely stream a
defense for the year based on the matchups.
So my strategy from the one hole
was different than it was from the late first round spots. I was able to amass
a huge amount of starting running back talent, and still have a few great wide
receivers. I feel that this team ended up pretty balanced, and has the chance
to have great expendable parts to possibly use to trade up to improve some
positions later.
