As we prepare for the 2024 fantasy football draft, it’s crucial to learn from the past season to identify the key players who can boost your team. While every season is different, by looking back at the best and worst draft picks from last year, we can look for archetypes of players to target. In this post, we'll delve into how specific draft picks impacted team success, using data from both ESPN and Sleeper leagues to examine how drafting specific players affected our championship odds.
The Data
As usual, I will be using public leagues to try to analyze who the best draft picks were. In this case, I have ~2500 public ESPN leagues and ~22,500 sleeper leagues. All of these leagues were snake drafts. To determine odds, we will look at the percent of teams that drafted a player who finished either in the playoffs (defined as a top 4 finish) or won the championship. Making the playoffs is usually an indicator of a strong regular season performance, while winning the championship can be skewed by playoff performance (as we will see). Finally, I limited the analysis to players that were drafted in at least 30% of leagues to help control for outlier draft picks.
Based on the average size of our leagues (10.2 for ESPN leagues, and 10.5 for sleeper leagues) we can also set our base rates of a 9.8% chance at winning the championship in ESPN and a 9.5% chance in sleeper. This gives us a 39.2% chance at the playoffs in ESPN and a 38.1% chance in sleeper.
Best 10 Draft Picks
ESPN Leagues
Ranking | Player | Playoff Odds | Championship Odds |
|---|---|---|---|
1 | CeeDee Lamb | 54.1% (+14.9%) | 26.1% (+16.3%) |
2 | Christian McCaffrey | 67% (+27.8%) | 20.4% (+10.6%) |
3 | Amon-Ra St. Brown | 47% (+7.8%) | 19.3% (+9.5%) |
4 | Breece Hall | 40.2% (+6.3%) | 16.2% (+1.1%) |
5 | Josh Allen | 53.3% (+14.1%) | 15% (+5.2%) |
6 | Lamar Jackson | 42.8% (+3.7%) | 14.4% (+4.6%) |
7 | Tyreek Hill | 57% (+17.8%) | 13.6% (+3.8%) |
8 | Ravens D/ST | 46.1% (+6.9%) | 13.4% (+3.6%) |
9 | James Conner | 39.5% (+0.3%) | 13.1% (+3.3%) |
10 | Zach Charbonnet | 43.9% (4.7%) | 12.9% (+3.1%) |
Table of the top 10 picks in ESPN leagues based on improvement in championship odds. Displayed as raw percentage chance and improvement from random.
CeeDee and McCaffrey make a lot of sense they were superstars that went on a tear to end the season. Tyreek and Amon-Ra would fall under this category as well. Simply put, your stars need to hit to win it all.
We have a couple of injured running backs in Breece Hall and James Conner. Both fell in drafts due to injury concerns and while they are very different backs, both suggest it is valuable to bet on injury.
We have 2 elite QBs in Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson. If we focus on just playoff odds. Jalen Hurts can be added to this group with the 5th best playoff odds (53.6%). While not definitive, these picks lend more anecdotal evidence to the changing value at the QB position and how the we may want to target early QBs in the draft.
Finally, we have 2 curveballs in the Ravens D/ST and Zach Charbonnet. My bet is that these both suggest the type of fantasy manager rather than the player themselves. For instance, Charbonnet was a popular sleeper pick among engaged managers.
Overall, the biggest takeaway from the Espn leagues is to not be afraid to bet on injury, particularly at the RB position. Also, don't be afraid of the early QB.
Sleeper Leagues
Ranking | Player | Playoff Odds | Champ Odds |
1 | Amon-Ra St. Brown | 44.5% (+6.4%) | 11.3% (+1.8%) |
2 | Justin Jefferson | 43.5% (+5.4%) | 11.2% (+1.7%) |
3 | Jahmyr Gibbs | 44.1% (+6.0%) | 11.0% (+1.5%) |
4 | Calvin Ridley | 43.4% (+5.3%) | 10.9% (+1.4%) |
5 | DJ Moore | 42.5% (+4.4%) | 10.9% (+1.4%) |
6 | Ja'Marr Chase | 42.6% (+4.5%) | 10.9% (+1.4%) |
7 | Justin Fields | 41.9% (+3.8%) | 10.9% (+1.4%) |
8 | Garrett Wilson | 43.8% (+5.8%) | 10.8% (+1.3%) |
9 | Bijan Robinson | 43% (+4.9%) | 10.8% (+1.3%) |
10 | CeeDee Lamb | 41.5% (+3.3%) | 10.8% (+1.3%) |
Table of the top 10 picks in Sleeper leagues based on improvement in championship odds. Displayed as raw percentage chance and improvement from random.
A couple of points jump out. First, drafting the best players had a significantly smaller impact on your championship odds in Sleeper leagues compared to ESPN. Second, there is a significant focus on WRs in this list with 7 of the top 10 being WRs. I think this has to do with differences between the platform settings (with PPR and 3 WR lineups being more common on Sleeper).
When we look at the specific players, the take aways are less clear. A couple of stars (Amon-Ra, JJ, Chase, Bijan, CeeDee), some popular boom picks (Jamyr Gibbs, Calvin Ridley, Garrett Wilson) and a relatively cheap stack in Fields and Moore. With the smaller impact overall, it suggests that there weren't many later round secrets and just took good drafting along the way.
Worst 10 Picks
ESPN leagues
Rank | Player | Playoffs Odds (%) | Championship odds (%) |
167 | Packers D/ST | 28.9% (-10.3%) | 6.3% (-3.5%) |
166 | Austin Ekeler | 33% (-6.2%) | 6.3% (-3.5%) |
165 | DK Metcalf | 32.4% (-6.7%) | 6.4% (-3.4%) |
164 | Jerry Jeudy | 30.9% (-8.3%) | 6.5% (-3.3%) |
163 | DJ Chark | 31% (-8.3%) | 6.6% (-3.2%) |
162 | Tee Higgins | 26.8% (-12.4%) | 6.7% (-3.1%) |
161 | Treylon Burks | 31.6% (-7.7%) | 6.8% (-3%) |
160 | Juju Smith Schuster | 33% (-6.2%) | 6.9% (-2.9%) |
159 | Patrick Mahomes | 34.7% (-4.5%) | 6.9% (-2.9%) |
158 | Tony Pollard | 39.2% (0%) | 7% (-2.8%) |
Table of the bottom 10 picks in ESPN leagues based on improvement in championship odds. Displayed as raw percentage chance and improvement from random.
We can see that failed draft picks tend to be early round busts (Ekeler, DK, Tee Higgins, Mahomes, and Pollard). There are a couple of players who were WR2's and the offense couldn't support a second fantasy option (Jeudy, DJ Chark, Treylon Burks, Juju, Higgins again). And then there is the Packers D/ST which I can only assume is people thinking they have a set and forget defense when they should have been streaming. Seeing Mahomes here also notes the risk of the early QB.
The other takeaway is that the effect size is smaller. The worst pick only hurt your chances by 3%, compared to a 16% increase from the best pick. The takeaway being don't be afraid to swing for the fences. Even a bust isn't that bad.
Sleeper Worst 10 picks
Ranking | Player | Playoff Odds | Champ Odds |
231 | Marquez Valdes Scantling | 31.8% (-6.3%) | 7.6% (-1.9%) |
230 | Hunter Renfrow | 32.1% (-6.0%) | 8% (-1.5%) |
229 | Chuba Hubbard | 34.1% (-4%) | 8.1% (-1.4%) |
228 | Michael Gallup | 33.1% (-5%) | 8.1% (-1.4%) |
227 | Isaiah Hodgins | 34% (-4.1%) | 8.1% (-1.4%) |
226 | Clyde Edwards Helaire | 34.2% (-3.8%) | 8.2% (-1.3%) |
225 | KJ Osborn | 33.5% (-4.6%) | 8.2% (-1.3%) |
224 | D'Onta Foreman | 34.2% (-3.9%) | 8.3% (-1.2%) |
223 | Brandon McManus | 36.8% (-1.3%) | 8.3% (-1.2%) |
222 | Rondale Moore | 35.1% (-3%) | 8.3% (-1.2%) |
Table of the bottom 10 picks in Sleeper leagues based on improvement in championship odds. Displayed as raw percentage chance and improvement from random.
Again, we see a stark difference between ESPN's worst picks and sleepers. Also interestingly, none of the sleeper picks are what I would consider true busts. None were high draft picks that didn't pan out. Instead, they were mid to late round picks, again with little effect on your overall odds (2% decrease at worst). I read this as again, don't be afraid to take chances, but also Sleeper leagues seem to be pretty well optimized with less variation due to skill.
Limitations
The big limitation is that we did not break the selections down by league type. We know that league settings can change the overall picture, so while this is a good starting point, we can dive into specific league setting combinations in the future to have a better sense of who the best picks for your league were.
Conclusions
Overall, the big conclusion is to not be afraid of swinging for the fences in your draft. The downside is capped in a way that the upside is not (or at least the cap is significantly higher). Some of the best picks were risky choices that paid off in a major way. This year, that makes me think of players like Achane.
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