Okay, so I’ve been messing around with fantasy football for a while now, and one thing that always bugged me was trying to figure out who to draft and when. I mean, there are tons of player rankings out there, but they’re all just, like, one giant list. It’s hard to see the real differences between players that way.
So, I started playing with this idea of tier rankings. Basically, grouping players together based on how good I think they’ll be. It’s not rocket science, but it helps me visualize things way better.
First, I grabbed a bunch of player projections. You know, the usual suspects – ESPN, Yahoo, whatever. I didn’t just want one opinion, I wanted a bunch of them to kinda average out.
Then, I dumped everything into a spreadsheet. Yep, good old spreadsheets. Nothing fancy, just a place to organize my thoughts (and a lot of numbers).
Next up, I started sorting. I looked at each position – QB, RB, WR, TE – separately. For each position, I eyeballed the projected points and looked for natural breaks. Like, where does it seem like there’s a significant drop-off in expected performance?
- Quarterbacks: I usually find 3-4 tiers here. The elite guys, the solid starters, the “maybe they’ll be good” guys, and the “avoid unless you’re desperate” guys.
- Running Backs: This one’s usually the trickiest, with the most tiers. There’s the workhorse backs, the potential breakout guys, the committee backs…it’s a mess, but the tiers help make sense of it.
- Wide Receivers: Similar to running backs, lots of tiers here. The stud WR1s, the reliable WR2s, the boom-or-bust guys… you get the idea.
- Tight Ends: Usually just a few tiers. The top couple of guys, then a big blob of “meh,” and then maybe a couple of dart throws at the bottom.
I went through this process a few times, adjusting the tiers as I went. It’s not an exact science, more like an art. You kinda get a feel for it after a while.
Finally, I had my tiered rankings. It is still important to consider the players individually within each tier. But having them grouped like this makes it so much easier to make decisions during the draft. It makes it super simple to compare players across postions.
It’s not perfect, and I’m always tweaking it, but it’s definitely helped me make better draft decisions. It just makes the whole thing feel a lot less overwhelming.