The Boys Fantasy Football 2023 draft recap hindsight
Playoffs?!?!?!?!
Welcome back fellow degenerates! Another year, another chance for me to take your money. I’ve already picked out the espresso machine I’m going to buy with my winnings. Its officially draft season, but I can’t wait so I figure a quick recap of last season’s draft will scratch the fantasy itch.
I was curious how well we all drafted. A conclusive answer would require a deep dive for several reasons. First, we’re all addicted to trading. Next, total season finishes do not tell the story of a draft pick (for example Mahomes finishing as QB7, but not scoring >18 points after week 12). Finally, missed games due to injury can put a lot of these finishes in persective like Justin Jefferson finishing as the WR36 with 8 games missed.
The best I could do (or cared to do) was to compare how we drafted players relative to how they finished in total fantasy points from weeks 1-17. I plotted each draft pick’s fantasy finish (x-axis) against their draft expectation (y-axis) with both along a log scale, since drafting the WR1 at WR10 is much more important than drafting the WR30 at WR40. The solid black line is y = x, so any draft pick above that line “exceeds” expectations, and any player below that line “fails to meet” expectations. Players are colored by position and I even changed their shapes because Jeff is color blind (hahahhaa).
A few things stand out. First off: Dave and I had terrible drafts by multiple metrics. We each drafted only a single top 10 player at any position (Lamar for me, Kamara for Dave). We both only drafted 2 players that exceeded expectations (Nico Collins for Dave / KW3 for me in addition to Lamar / Kamara).
| Team Name | Players above expectation |
|---|---|
| Fields of Dreams | 9 |
| I Pickens Boogies | 8 |
| LaPorta’s Pus**ies 🦁 | 8 |
| RIP Kirko Chainz | 7 |
| Zach White Commanders | 7 |
| Token Female | 7 |
| Hamas Rockets | 7 |
| Good on Paper | 7 |
| PP Hurts | 6 |
| Team Jeff | 5 |
| Mr. Big Chest | 2 |
| Michael Ohers Conservators | 2 |
I hold as a personal belief the most important goal of the draft is to “hit” on your first 4 picks. Lets see who had the highest average finish among their first 4 picks:
| Team Name | Average finish of top 4 picks |
|---|---|
| PP Hurts | 38.5 |
| Mr. Big Chest | 31.25 |
| Good on Paper | 24 |
| Hamas Rockets | 20.5 |
| Token Female | 19 |
| Team Jeff | 16 |
| Fields of Dreams | 14.5 |
| LaPorta’s Pus**ies 🦁 | 13.5 |
| I Pickens Boogies | 12.25 |
| Michael Ohers Conservators | 12 |
| RIP Kirko Chainz | 7.25 |
| Zach White Commanders | 3.5 |
Again, Mr. Big Chest missed out big here, with JJ (injury), Kupp (injury), Ridley (miss), and Kirk Cousins (injury) but managed to survive the season by trading Leonard Fournette for Isiah Pacheco (RB13….), Mixon + Ridley for Breece Hall, and later Hall and Swift for CMC. PP Hurts had the worst average finish among their first 4 picks with Hurts (QB2), Waddle (kind of injured WR29), and Mattison (RB34), but were ruined by the Chubb injury in week 2. Zach really took my advice here and started as strong as he finished with Josh Allen (QB1), Mixon (RB7), ARSB (WR3), and TJ Hockenson (TE3… anyone remember that? Because I sure don’t).