Fantrax Followup

Doug Green Posted On August 15, 2017

Recently I had the opportunity to participate in a fun league on the Fantrax platform. The setup was everything an IDP fantasy degenerate could hope for. It’s a 70-man Superflex league with full IDP and 0.5 PPR along with 1.5 TE PPR, plus we also had a 20-round devy draft that also included IDP.

The league also included some heavy hitters, including DLF’s own FF Ghost and IDP with Bee, along with Saturday2Sunday’s Bill Latin.

I was lucky enough to draft from the 1.02 spot for the startup draft. Unfortunately I pulled the 1.10 in the devy draft.

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Once the draft started I took David Johnson with my first selection. This was long before the Zeke Elliott news broke, but with only 0.5 PPR and Superflex, I decided to wait on WR and focus on RB and QB early on. When the startup swung back to me, well, I kind of moved away from that. The thing with picking on the turn like I was, you have to basically make two decisions in one. Plus, you have to anticipate any runs that appear to be starting.

So when the 2/3 turn came I took Derek Carr and T.Y. Hilton. Even with the 0.5 PPR I still wanted a strong WR1.

The 4/5 turn brought me my first IDP selection. Yes, I, along with most other analysts, will preach waiting on your defensive players until your offensive lineup is set. But it wasn’t my fault. Bee opened the fourth round by taking Khalil Mack and he forced my hand. So I grabbed Luke Keuchly with my 4th rounder and followed him up with Dalvin Cook. I am not as concerned about Keuchly’s concussion from last season, so I feel like I got a game changer.

I had never done a startup with Bee before but I quickly learned that he targets specific IDP assets and goes after them aggressively. The one rule about drafting that I always follow is “Be prepared to throw the plan out the window” and I had to employ it in this draft. My plan for the 4/5 turn was to pick up a TE but I didn’t want to let a high-end LB slip away. My instincts were correct as six IDPs went off the board before I picked again including a run of Deion Jones, (Bee), Alec Ogletree (Bill), JJ Watt (Chris Johnson), and Joey Bosa (LJ Chaney).

I also managed to land all of my targets at the safety position though. I snagged Eric Berry in the 15th round, then went Tyrann Mathieu and Jabrill Peppers at the 18/19 turn.

On the devy side I decided I wanted to be more aggressive. I tried to trade up to the first two picks to secure Saquon Barkley or Derrius Guice, but the guys with those picks wouldn’t budge. I don’t blame them, I wouldn’t have made any kind of deal either. I stayed at 1.10 and took Nick Chubb who I still consider to be the third-best runner in college football. My second selection was Christian Kirk, the WR from Texas A&M. Immediately before that though, James Washington came off the board. After I made my Kirk pick, I swung a deal for Washington for my next devy selection plus a startup pick. Some might feel that’s an overpay, but in my mind I secured my No. 1 WR next year and got three of the top 15 devy assets.

Unfortunately, that move cost me my chance at Derwin James, the Florida State safety that I consider to be the best player overall in college football. Still, I would make that same deal 10 out of 10 times, even knowing the outcome. A bit surprising to me, that was the only trade I made during the draft. Normally I am very active sliding up and down as needed. In this draft there was tons of value sliding to me in the middle rounds so I elected to stay put.

My first devy IDP selection turned out to be Skai Moore, LB from South Carolina in the eighth round. I went hard after IDPs in the final 10 rounds of the devy draft, securing Nick De Luca (11), Jake Cichy (12), Nick Bosa (13), Daelin Hayes (14), Rashan Gary (16), Darvin Taylor II (17), and Grant Delpit (19).

The nice part about holding the devy and startup simultaneously is that if you don’t create depth in the startup, you can fill in with your devy picks. The bad part for me is I feel like I need to balance the two drafts. I had already done two other devy/startup combos earlier this summer, both did the startup then the devy draft. One I executed my plan, going Zero RB in the startup then going RB heavy in the devy auction. The other? Well not so much. I tried to pull off the same plan, but didn’t have enough devy auction money to pull it off and had to make a deal to fill in my RB holes.

I did enjoy using the Fantrax platform. It’s interface was similar to MFL, but had some of it’s own design. I did miss the text notifications for when I was on the clock, but ESPN and Yahoo doesn’t offer that option either.

One thing I did like and tried to use to my advantage with the dual position designation. On Fantrax you can draft someone and play them at whatever position you want. For example, I selected Calais Campbell as a DT and plan to play him there. The ability to get DE production at a DT spot is something I very much want to explore. I know Bee was very excited to land Mack as a DE. This potentially could help offset that tricky positional designation problem we run into.

Overall I was quite pleased with the way my team turned out though my quarterbacks could probably use some work along with my WRs. I’m extremely pleased with my tight end and linebacking corps though. I managed to land Keuchly, Reuben Foster, Derrick Johnson, and Jalen Reeves-Maybin.

I’ve laid out my squad for you below.

QB: Derek Carr, Carson Palmer, Jimmy Garrappolo, Josh Dobbs (R)

RB: David Johnson, Dalvin Cook (R), Matt Forte, Will Gallman (R), CJ Spiller, Buck Allen

WR: TY Hilton, Jordy Nelson, Michael Crabtree, Larry Fitzgerald, Nelson Agholor, Ted Ginn, Terrance Williams, Rashad Higgins, Justin Hardy

TE: Greg Olsen, Tyler Eifert, Jason Witten, Jake Butt (R), Tyler Higbee, MyCole Pruitt

DE: Cameron Wake, Michael Bennett, Derek Barnett (R), Akeem Hicks, Dante Fowler, Dawuane Smoot (R), Ejuan Price (R), Vinny Curry, Deatrich Wise (R)

DT: Calais Campbell, Jonathan Allen (R), Star Lotulelei, Ra’Shede Hageman, Carlos Watkins (R), Davon Godchaux (R)

LB: Luke Keuchly, Reuben Foster, Derrick Johnson, Thomas Davis, Stephone Anthony, Jalen Reeves-Maybin (R), Vince Biegel (R)

S: Eric Berry, Tyrann Mathier, Jabrill Peppers (R), Adrian Amos, Daniel Sorenson

CB: Logan Ryan, Damarious Randall, Tre’Davious White (R), Prince Amukamara, Brandon Carr, Terrance Newman

IDP

QB: Trace McSorley (Penn St), Tua Tagovaoloa, (Alabama), Kyle Allen (Houston)