How to draft a fantasy football winner – 2012 edition (Rounds 9-15)

This article assumes you already read the first page (Rounds 1-8) if you didn’t please click here

Rounds 9-13

Fred Jackson was one of the best late round picks of 2012 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

After the first 8 rounds are complete it is time to start looking for the best value picks of the draft.  At most you will want to roster 1 backup WR and let me explain why.  Running backs touch the ball more often on a game by game basis, making them more valuable but also making them more susceptible to injuries.  When one of your RB’s go down, you don’t want to have to turn to the waiver wire, and hope you have a high enough priority to grab your guys backup.  Chances are if you play in a competitive format, and a RB goes down to injury 80% of owners will put in a waiver request for the backup.  Another factor to consider is that if you have 4 solid backup RB’s, you have more trade bait as RB’s are typically the hottest commodity in fantasy football.  You will also have a higher likely hood of hitting this year’s Fred Jackson, a late round steal from 2011.  If there is a big name WR there in round 9 you will want to snatch him up, but more often than not there will be plenty of marginal WR available on the waiver wire in season.

For rounds 9-13 go after a backup RB that has a high chance of succes in 2012.  Names like Peyton Hillis, Ronnie Hillman, and C.J. Spiller come to mind.  If the #1 RB gets injured in front of any of those guys they will step in as the go to guy, and provide fantasy points.

Many owners get unnecessarily worried about having a backup TE/K and DEF for their BYE week.  Don’t sweat it, even if there is a financial penalty for doing an add/drop, by the time the bye weeks hit you will either have lost a player for the season to injury, or have a player who is performing so poorly they are an easy drop.  Stream the players that are necessary to fill in for your bye weeks, but make sure you hold on to as many RB’s as possible.  At the beginning of the season it may seem silly, but once guys start tearing ACL’s and MCL’s you will be happy you have the backups and don’t have to hit the waiver wire to find a loss solid option

 Round 14 and 15

These two rounds are up to you.  At this point you will need a kicker and a defense, and in many fantasy leagues some of the “top” options at these positions go as early as round 9.  The reason you don’t draft a kicker or defense before the end of the draft are varied but simple.  For the kickers, there are so many kickers available that will produce nearly the same points week in and week out that you don’t need to jump on one early.  There are only a few elite RB’s like Arian Foster and LeSean McCoy, that is why they need to be selected first.  The defenses should go last because they hardly ever perform the way you predict.  The hot pick in 2011 was the Philadelphia Eagles and they didn’t even finish in the top ten.  About the safest pick you can make for defense is the Bears, because they have a great return game with Devin Hester, but with the way kickoffs are positioned these days, his use is limited.  Let the other teams use their earlier picks on DEF and K, while you load up on your favorite sleeper RB’s of 2012

You should be ready for your draft now, make sure you head over and print out the latest rankings from our draft kit to use for your draft day.  Good luck in 2012 fantasy football, and be sure to check out our forums where we will be active throughout the season providing advice for all owners.