Fantasy football draft strategy for RB's is simple to me, draft them early and often and keep on drafting them. In most fantasy football drafts, even in keeper leagues, I will draft a RB with my 1st three picks, sometimes my first four picks.
Why such emphasis on one position? Let's do a little math. There are 32 teams in the NFL. Each team has basically one starting RB that you want. If there are 10 teams in your fantasy football league that is only 3 starting RB's available for each team. If you have 4 or 5 starting RB's on your roster you are shrinking the talent pool available and getting a decided edge on your opponents.
With 4 or 5 or more starting RB's on your roster you will probably never have to worry about having to pick up a waiver wire RB who might give you a lucky TD in any given week. Injuries and bye weeks will not affect your team that much. But by cutting the talent pool down at RB you will be creating serious problems for some of your opponents.
Everybody has to deal with injuries and the bye weeks in fantasy football and the one position that is the problem is RB. With 32 starting QB's available and only one playing each week, depth is rarely a problem. The WR position is also always available on the waiver wires because each NFL team has at least two starting WR's you can use, or 64 total.
The RB position is the key to your building a winning fantasy football team. In 9 years of playing fantasy football I have won 5 championships playing in 21 different leagues. My RB draft strategy has been the key to winning those championships. My very first draft pick in a keeper league was Marshall Faulk. Over the years I have also drafted Shaun Alexander and Larry Johnson. While Faulk was already a starting RB when I drafted him, Alexander and Johnson were not. How did I draft them?
Before each fantasy football draft season I will write down the starting RB's for each of the 32 NFL teams. I will then decide which RB's I would like to have on my team and rank them. When it's my turn to draft I will select the RB that's still left atop my draft board.
After I have ranked the starting RB's I will also write down the likely backup RB for each team. Then I will decide which backups have the best chance of getting serious playing time and possibly giving me meaningful fantasy points. Then I will target those RB's in my drafts as soon as all the starters are gone. The more RB's you draft the better your chances of getting the next stud RB.
If you want to compete successfully and possibly win your fantasy football league this year your draft must center around the RB position. Draft them early and often and keep on drafting them!
