Before I go and try to sound authoritative on the subject, I should point out that I have never played fantasy football. It’s not that I hate the idea, it’s just that I have enough visibility into that world to know that I would be drawn into it forever and would most likely emerge from it as a late-period Howard Hughes-esque ghoul who had sacrificed every human relationship in the quest to win a few hundred bucks and a hunk of plastic. What’s that you say… I can win more than that? I’ll have to think about that. But I’m a guy who gets a little too wrapped up in things. Like this blog. Or every single game in the Sid Meier’s Civilization series. This is kind of scary to put in writing, but I’ve thrown more than 2,000 hours into Civ5. Yup, 2,000 plus. That’s a year of 40 hour work weeks without any vacation.
Anyway, don’t listen to me for fantasy football advice. I think I might be able to point out some useful stuff from time to time, but I’m not the guy you want picking your lineups. Unless you want someone to blame when things turn stinky, that is. But, having said all that, there’s a piece I read last year that fascinates me. A writer named Shawn Siegele over at Rotoviz (most of the site is behind a paywall) wrote a great article about turning the fantasy draft strategy on its head by drafting zero running backs. Pardon me if I’m late to the game, but the thought hadn’t occurred to me before, and I loved it. Don’t bother with my breakdown though, be sure to read his whole piece here (not behind a paywall).
I’m an enormous fan of the brilliant and often maddening writing of Nassim Nicholas Taleb. His books, “The Black Swan,” “Fooled By Randomness,” and, “Antifragile,” are all worth the read, even if they sometimes make you frustrated enough that you have to put them down for a few days. With, “Antifragile,” Taleb argues that there’s an enormous value in building systems that grow stronger when they are stressed. Siegele, in that piece I linked above, applies that concept to fantasy football rosters. Instead of using valuable draft picks on marquee running backs, he prefers to just nab their backups in later rounds (or in free agency). The idea is that big injuries (which happen every single week) will hurt your opponents rather than you, thereby making your team stronger. There’s a fine line between rooting for injuries and simply being prepared for them, and I think Siegele comes in on the right side of that. But if you’re a fantasy player and you’re wrestling with draft strategies, at least give this one a look…. and then argue about it incessantly in the comments section.
