The Fabulous Life of FAAB

John DiBari

As we approach the fantasy playoffs, more than half of the fantasy teams out there will see their season conclude. This is always an opportune time to reflect on the current year and see what lessons you can apply in the future. I like to look back at how I spent my FAAB (free agent acquisition budget) money.

For ease of understanding and to make the math easier, I’ll base all my numbers on teams having $100 in FAAB to start the year. If your league uses $200, double the numbers. If your league uses $1,000, add a zero, so forth, and so on, you get it. Unlike redraft leagues, dynasty leagues are a year-round endeavor. It’s never too early to look ahead to next year and make plans on how you’ll spend your FAAB in the future.

More or less, there are three common strategies when it comes to spending your FAAB. There are owners who don’t use their FAAB early in the year, sitting on it until the playoffs approach. Conversely, other owners blow through their FAAB early, when players emerge in the first few weeks of the season. And in between, there are those owners who come at it with a balanced approach. They’ll use their FAAB judiciously each and every week. There are pros and cons to each style.

Save it for Later

I’ve gone this route in the past. I don’t hate it, but I didn’t love the results either. Basically, you don’t spend a big chunk of your FAAB early in the year. The strategy is that as the playoffs draw near, you have more money to overpay for players who can be league winners in the playoffs. And, since you’ve saved your FAAB dollars, you are in a position to bully other owners who have less money. For example, if other owners only have $40 remaining but you have held onto $80, you could, theoretically, bid twice as much on late-season free agents.

The main criticism of this technique is two-fold. First, if you’re intentionally holding your FAAB monies, you will miss out on early-season free agents. Those early-season free agents could help your team all season long and in the playoffs. Second, if there aren’t any catastrophic late-season injuries, you won’t have any players to spend your FAAB on. Saving your FAAB does you no good if there aren’t any players to spend it on as the playoffs draw near. The lone exception to this would be if you find yourself in one of the rare leagues that allow you to roll over FAAB money to the off-season or next season.

Blow Through it Early

This has been my go-to technique in recent years. My thinking on it is this: you’re getting the most bang for your buck spending it on players early. Again, making the math as easy as possible, let’s say you spend $16 on a player in week one. With the fantasy season (including the playoffs) lasting 16 weeks, you’re acquiring a player for $1 per week. Whereas, acquiring a player for $16 ahead of week 16 puts their acquisition cost at $16 per week. The value of your FAAB is never higher than it is at the start of the year.

Converse to the “save it for later” technique, you need to be in a position to make the playoffs and in contention for a championship for that to work. Spending your FAAB early to acquire impact players is what might enable you to make the playoffs in the first place. Every year, we see this when several early-season waiver wire additions end up as key contributors to fantasy teams hoping to make the playoffs. This year, for example, the Cowboys lost Blake Jarwin in week one. Dalton Schultz stepped in for him and has performed admirably, currently ranked as the TE10 on the season. Given the wasteland at fantasy tight end, Schultz has been one of the biggest FAAB steals of the year. You’re probably not going to acquire an equally reliable option in week 14 as you push for a championship.

Balanced Approach

Caught in between the saving and spending approaches, you’ll find the balanced approach. It’s self-explanatory. $100 in FAAB over 16 weeks, averaged out, gives you about $6.25 per week to spend. If you eliminate the playoffs and only look at the 13-week season, you’re looking at just under $8 per week, approximately eight-percent of your budget weekly. Keep in mind, if you really like someone one week and use 16-percent of your budget, remember that in another week, you’re going to need to refrain from bidding on anyone to keep your budget in line.

The criticism here is that you might never get the better, higher-priced, free agents by playing it safe each week. You handicap yourself early in the year against owners who are spending big early, and you also won’t have enough money left to compete in the late-season free-agent market either against the owners who saved their money. Playing it safe rarely works in fantasy. Fortune favors the bold, and I’ve never found success with the balanced approach.

What to do?

They’re your fantasy teams with your real-life money on the line, so do whatever you’re comfortable with. However, for me, I would never use a balanced approach again. I’ve never used it successfully in my 20ish years of playing fantasy football. For a long time, I used the save it for later method. Although it has worked on a few occasions, more often than not, as I mentioned above, I ended up with too much money at the end of the year or grossly overpaying for lesser-than players to burn through it in the season’s final weeks.

The last few seasons, I’ve been hammering free agents early, and I’ve been happy with the results. In an IDP league this year, I spent over 90% of my FAAB going into week two, and honestly, I’ve been happy with the results. I may have missed out on a few players in the middle of the season, but truthfully, I got significantly more bang for my buck on those early guys. The only other option I’d recommend is dumping half of your FAAB in the first few weeks and the other half as the playoffs approach. Somewhat of a save it and spend it hybrid, but I can’t speak to its efficacy as I’ve never employed that approach.

As the fantasy playoffs draw nearer, spelling the end of the season for the majority of owners, it’s an ideal time to look back and reevaluate your decisions of the past year. Whether you’ve played fantasy football for three decades or are new to the game, there are always fresh and different strategies and methodologies to employ that can make you a better dynasty and fantasy owner going forward. One of the few things you have control over once the season commences is how you attack free agency. Maybe you missed out on a few players this year because you mismanaged your FAAB. A change in your approach next season may prevent that from happening in the future and might just be the difference in winning a championship or drafting early again. Good luck!

john dibari