Back to Basics: Preseason IDP Roster Construction

Bob Brannon Posted On July 28, 2017

This is my first write-up here at DLF, and I’m humbled to join the team. I’ve been reading these articles since subscribing last year and will sorely miss the great advice from Steve Wyremski. I have been plugged in to the musings of the DLF Forum for a few years now; mostly IDP and Salaries/Contracts and have learned a lot of great strategy (and some forgettable analysis), but I continually find myself circling back to the basics.

After all of the hard work we put into evaluating players and rookies in the early off-season months of January through July… the game-changers are typically guys we miss in our process. I’m thinking of Antonio Brown, Tyreek Hill, Kwon Alexander, and Stefon Diggs as a few late-round examples that were absolutely huge to hit on. “How do we find them?” is a good question. Better yet, “Do we have room for them on our rosters?”

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Roster Cloggers

August is just around the corner, and training camps are getting started this week. We’re all starting to feel the excitement of the season starting in just over a month. Let us not allow that excitement to scramble our strategy! It is still way too early to be rostering a kicker or punter. I have yet to find a scoring format that gives those positions any reliable advantage. Those roster cloggers are simply limiting your number of chances at rostering valuable sleeper-starters. On that note: 58% of leagues have standard scoring for cornerbacks (non-weighted).

weighted dt cb scoring

Even if you are required to start two in a 16 team league, you gain no discernable advantage to having a top option at the position. Unless your league is requiring more than two starters – or you have weighted scoring – cornerback in July/August is a roster clogger.

Right now: take a look around your league and write down which owners are cornerback heavy. Those are the guys you want to offer your top scoring cornerback to after a great season. I once sold Trumaine Johnson for 2.10 in a deep league. No Ragrets.

Roster Limits

Every league has a defined roster limit. If your league allows for expanded rosters in the off-season, what are you doing with those extra spots? Are they unfilled? Shame, shame if they are. It still amazes me to scroll through the ‘Rosters’ report and see teams well under the roster limit AND rostering multiple K/Ps. Now, I’m not going to help my leaguemates with their strategy, but I do want to highlight this. They are severely limiting their chances at mining a gem as mentioned earlier.

Hopefully your league doesn’t regulate position limits. Wow, did I hate that in my first league. Invariably, linebacking crews get wrecked by injury, so my best advice in this department is VOLUME. Yeah, I’ve had some stud linebackers in Lavonte David, Luke Kuechly, Bobby Wagner, Alec Ogletree, etc… and they are nice to have. If you think you’re good with just four, though, you are setting up for disaster. The injury rate is very high at this level of the defense. Some players can stay healthier than others; I tend to like the bigger MIKE backers for this reason, but that’s just me.

Whatever your approach is with your linebacking crew, I strongly suggest committing the most IDP roster spots to this bunch of hopefuls. I tend to roster 12-15 linebackers this time of year (preseason). AJ Klein and Jelani Jenkins have been a pair of my favorite stashes. I call them stashes because I paid little for them on the chance they win their starting spots. I’ll cut back to 10-12 linebackers to start the season because not all of my zero-LBs win their training-camp battles.

I want to give a quick mention to defensive linemen and strong safeties: double up on them. If you start two… roster four. I currently carry five to six strong safeties because I do not pay too much for them. I hesitate to say that I use a zero-safety approach, but half of the six on my roster are zero-safety candidates. Micah Hyde and Eric Reid are replacement-level commodities at safety (and should be acquired at replacement price), but I stash these types of strong safeties because of their price and new opportunities. I do not advocate to do this with defensive tackle nor defensive end position groups, however. I do recommend you spend like those are safe investment vehicles. They get better with age, so don’t be afraid of a 26 year old defensive lineman. He is likely hitting his prime.

Know Your Format

One of the difficult things about getting/giving sound advice in the IDP world is the wide array of league formats. When I first began in IDP, I spent a ton of effort mining for every-down linebackers because they would give me high tackle totals. As my leagues have evolved to include more big-play scoring, I now have broadened my search for LB2 to LB4 points and can give a broader response to others asking this question. If you don’t know the value of scarcity in your league’s format, you will not be able to identify where to spend your precious roster spots. You must figure out how to value your format and sock your capital into the premium position groups.

Cold Hard Truth

Preseason rosters are the healthiest rosters you will see. Every one of your competitors is looking at his roster right now and salivating over his starting lineup. Let us not get wrapped up in filling out our lineup card here in July. Don’t roster a player that offers no shot at becoming a difference-maker for your lineup. I’m talking about K, P, and CB (for 58% of you). Treat your roster spots like they are too valuable to be clogging and you will find that your roster is that much more to be excited about than the other guys in your league.

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