Best Ball

Dynasty Dilemma: Rashee Rice

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Dynasty Dilemma: Rashee Rice

 

I'm going to begin by stating that I, Brendon Booth, H A T E the Kansas City Chiefs. Now, I don't say that because I've been a Raiders fan for over 40 years, although I do for that reason, as well. It's simply this: as a fantasy football analyst, I hate the fact that the Chiefs have rostered seven wide receivers and nobody knows what to do with them. I say this as an owner of Kadarius Toney. I say this as an owner of Justyn Ross. I say this as a 30% shareholder of Deneric Prince who was squeezed off of the 53-man roster to make room for KC's 7th WR. And I say this as an NON-owner of Rashee Rice, in spite of the fact that I would like to have him on one or more of my rosters.

Rice was a stud at pass-heavy SMU. He was drafted by the Chiefs in the 2nd round of the 2023 draft and you would think that draft capital would quickly earn him a heavy role in the Chiefs offense. There is just too much competition in that WR room to get a great feel of how he is going to be deployed. If he is an integral piece, earning a high enough target share from Patrick Mahomes to be relevant in fantasy, then he could be a nice waiver wire pick-up for you, if he's available. This is our dynasty dilemma. Let's dig a little deeper on this rookie, though, and see if we can figure something out together.

As I said, Rice holds 2nd round draft capital. While one of the prime indicators of fantasy success for wide receivers is being drafted in the first round, there are plenty of 2nd rounders that hold significant value. Christian Watson, George Pickens, and the Chiefs' own Skyy Moore were all 2nd rounders in 2022. 2021 saw Elijah and Rondale Moore both go early on Day 2. In 2020, the 2nd round WRs included Tee Higgins, Michael Pittman, Jr., and personal favorite Van Jefferson. While all of these guys vary in their potential offerings, you can see how 2nd rounders can be viable assets.

On the field, Rice presents some true upside. While his 4.51 combine 40-time isn't ideal, Rice offers elite level explosiveness with a 1.49 10-yard split placing him in the 92nd percentile, and a 41-inch vertical jump, good for a 96th percentile spot. In basketball, they call that "jumping out of the building." His 6'1", 204 lb frame makes him big enough to be a contested catch target and a red-zone threat as he plays even bigger than his stature. Rice is more than capable as a route-runner in short and intermediate situations but is even better on deep throws, and he is good at creating yards after the catch. He also shared college targets with fellow SMU teammates, now in the NFL, Danny Gray of the 49ers, and Philadelphia Eagles TE Grant Calcaterra.

Rashee Rice offers the size, skillset, athletic profile, and college pedigree that you want, and the draft capital of at least 6 WRs in the top 48 of dynasty rankings. His current DynastyPros ranking of 53 just screams "SLEEPER."

Did I mention that I hate the Chiefs' WR situation? Marquez Valdes-Scantling, Kadarius Toney, and Skyy Moore are poised just under TE Travis Kelce as starting targets for Patrick Mahomes. Justin Watson, Justyn Ross, Richie James, and Rice round out the receiving corps, with Rice listed on the depth chart as the backup Z, or flanker, to Toney. Now, Toney has a pretty sketchy injury history which could lead to the perfect opportunity for Rice to slide into the starting mix, but the Chiefs have stated that Rice, along with Ross will "start out as 'package' players." So IF there's an injury to Toney and Rice graduates to the flanker role, there could be some value there.

Depth chart position isn't the only thing working against Rice. Let's take a second and look at his teammate Skyy Moore and HIS situation as a rookie in Andy Reid's offense. Moore, again, also a 2nd round pick was limited to the point of irrelevance as a rookie. Moore is slightly smaller and a little bit faster than Rice, and is more suited to the Y or slot role, and he earned lower than a 30% target share as a rookie, in 16 games. He had 22 catches for 250 yards, had an average target depth of 7.7 yards, and earned just 5.7% of team air yards. Contrast that with fellow rookie George Pickens who, albeit in a different role, had one-third the drop rate of Moore and almost four times the receptions on three times the targets, an aDOT of 14.7 yards, and 27.4% of team air yards. If the Chiefs believe the best thing for Rice is to slowly acclimate, his only spot in your roster is on the taxi squad.

The final drawback to Rice hasn't anything to do with situation or ability, it's in his attitude. He has been reported as "nonchalant" in his intent and "takes plays off." He also hasn't shown a desire to increase his commitment to detail as a route runner and chooses to "get by" on size and physical abilities rather than technique. Reports are that he ran a very limited route-tree in college and a poor attitude means that he could be in trouble if he is supposed to improve in the NFL. If all Rice wants to do is run downfield and catch jump balls for glory, there is a place for that, but it won't equate to much production.

After investigation, I might be better off, at this point, not owning any shares of Rashee Rice, and you may be, too. That means, however, that his value is at an all-time low. If his usage rate mirrors Skyy Moore's as a rookie, Rice will definitely be worth a stash if you have a taxi squad spot open. His value is that of a handcuff running back or a mid to late 2nd round rookie pick in 2024 or 2025. If you are trading with a Rice owner, don't be afraid to add him to the receiving side in exchange for a 3rd rounder or a Jordan Mason type. If waiting on his potential, which he has plenty of, is good enough for Andy Reid, it should be good enough for us.

 

Dynasty Dilemma: Trey Lance

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Dynasty Dilemma: Trey Lance (Updated)

UPDATE: Per Adam Schefter, Lance was traded to the Dallas Cowboys. Schefter’s report was released at 4:22 pm on 8/25/2022, about 3 and a half hours before this article was posted. It is important to note that the trade does not change the following analysis. The only change is the potential for Lance to start if there is an injury to Dak Prescott. You may proceed as outlined.

The year is 2000. A young man walks into a fortune teller’s shop on his town’s main street. Not in the downtown area, but on the edge of town. The man sits down at the crystal ball and the fortune teller lays out the wildest tale. She tells the young man, an expectant father that he will have a son. That son will grow up to be a highly coveted quarterback. That quarterback will earn a starting position for his national champion college team as a sophomore, lead that team to a 16-0 record and another national championship, and throw 28 touchdowns that year without throwing an interception in 287 attempts. The boy would also rush for 1100 yards that season and add 14 more touchdowns. The young man is stunned.

The fortune teller goes on to tell the man that his son will enter the 2021 NFL Draft at the age of 20, and be picked by the San Francisco 49ers with the 3rd overall pick, after trading 2 first round picks and 2 other picks to move up and draft their guy. He will eventually grow into a man standing 6’4″, weighing 225 pounds, and running a 4.5 second 40-yard dash. Now the young father-to-be is bewildered. His son is going to be a superstar!

 

 

6 months earlier, a different expectant father goes into a different fortune teller’s shop. The fortune teller explains that HIS son is going to be 6’1″, run a 4.85 40, have an unheralded college career on a normal 4-year track, and be passed on in HIS draft 261 times, before the 49ers draft him to be a backup, maybe, and he’ll earn the nickname given the last pick, “Mr. Irrelevant.” This young father is also bewildered. He wanted a superstar. Now he’s convinced he’s got a palooka.

 

 

Neither fortune teller would see that 23 years later, the palooka would be announced as the starting QB for the 49ers, and the shine would be off of the superstar. The 49ers would be scrambling to figure out what to do with the product of their huge investment. YOU are also wondering what to do with that huge investment.

 

We have been in a Dynasty League holding pattern with Lance for, going on, 3 seasons. There is no new statistical analysis that can change that. Upside is the only argument to be made in Lance’s favor. It’s still a good one.

None of the events of the last three seasons have changed Lance’s POTENTIAL. He’s still the physical specimen that he was before, as noted above. He still has the same arm strength, the same foot speed and elusiveness, and the same brain that Kyle Shanahan dubbed highly intelligent.

He’s extremely intelligent. He knows how to handle situations. He knows how to carry himself. The guy that I see on tape that I tried to describe that I see such a natural quarterback, such a smart player.

Let’s look at Jordan Love, for an example. He is the same size as Lance, but as slow as Purdy. Love was drafted the year before Lance, and didn’t see the field as a rookie. He played sparingly in his next two seasons and has only seen regular season game action 10 times for the Packers. By every indication, however, he’s ready to start at age 24. He’ll turn 25 mid-season and Lance will be 25 just short of 2 years from now.

Lance has plenty of time to assume his final form. With his draft profile hampered by injury and team situation, he has an opportunity to add on to the improvements he’s made with his technique. He just needs reps. He’ll find them wherever he is because the NFL isn’t going to give up on him, and neither should you.

Buy low, sell high is the Dynasty mantra. This will be the lowest ever point for Lance’s value, until he retires.

 

 

Again, there is very little statistical basis to justify selling Lance. You could point to injury history or throwing interceptions against the Raiders in his first 2023 pre-season game. What it boils down to is that he doesn’t have a job, at the moment. He will be, for the time being, a roster suck. He won’t be startable in your lineup.

 

 

Rostered: depending on your league environment, Lance is a hold. If you have the roster depth to absorb a zero production wait-n’-see, wait it out. At this point, nobody wants him. Do not sell low.

Trades: Throw out offers, again if you can absorb the lack of production. If you can’t handle the roster spot, create a dynastyprosfootball.com Trey Lance alert and stay on top of the player news to scoop him off waivers as soon as he gets another opportunity.

Startup and Redraft: Avoid

 

Introduction to Best Ball

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Week 17. The week. Imagine waking up Sunday, December 31st to one of your Best Ball Mania IV (BBMIV) teams in the final round of the biggest Underdog fantasy football tournament to date. Your team battled victorious through the regular season and climbed the ranks in the resulting tournament. By the end of the day, you could be a millionaire. 

That will be the reality for over 400 bettors waking up on the final day of the year, hoping for the ultimate New Year’s gift of winning $3 million. Thousands of BBMIV players are searching for the strategy or trick that will give them even a slight edge over the competition. Statistics show your odds of making it into the tournament are roughly 16%. These odds could be increased to nearly 20% by stacking, correlating, and focusing on The Week, week 17. 

 

BEST BALL 

Best Ball is a form of fantasy football that allows a contestant to draft a team and then have a hands-free experience all season. Unlike redraft leagues, one does not need to select a few players off the bench to be “active” in the hopes of choosing the highest weekly performers. Instead, Best Ball’s platform automatically selects the players with the highest position score into each slot weekly. With Best Ball, you draft your team, and the rest is taken care of. The downside, there are no trades allowed throughout the season, so it is imperative to draft enough of the right players for each position to cover bye weeks, low performing weeks, and unexpected injuries, etc. 

Best Ball is by far my preferred method to bet in fantasy football. With over 300 teams this year in various tournaments through Underdog, and over 500 teams through FanDuel, I have been able to maximize my tournament entries with low maintenance over the season. I won’t have any weekly matchups to stress about, nor will I worry about leaving points on my bench again!

 

UNDERDOG

If this is your introduction to Best Ball, you may also be new to Underdog, a fantasy sports app that hosts open field tournaments for bettors to win astonishing amounts of money, throwing traditional season long betting out the window. Players compete in 12-man leagues throughout the season. However, one bet also allows league winners a chance to participate in the end of the season tournament. 

Underdog’s BBMIV is the granddaddy tournament with contestants vying for a $3 million grand prize. Other tournaments are available based on the amount of the entry fee and draft length. For example, a Fast Puppy entry costs $5 and players are allotted 30 seconds to make draft picks. Alternatively, an entry into a Mastiff will set you back $1000 and will likely have a slow draft – an 8-hour clock for each draft pick. While each play style consists of 12-man leagues, different league placements advance players into the end tournament. For example, 1st & 2nd place in BBMIV continue on, while the top 6 in each league move on in the Mastiff. Familiarize yourself with the different tournament options and parameters before placing your bet. 

The style of tournament you choose could drastically change your draft strategy. During a Mastiff draft, I created a Kelce-Mahomes stack using my 1st and 2nd round picks. Picking a TE & QB that early in the draft is not an ideal strategy in a larger field tournament (i.e. BBMIV) where having a unique team is what wins. However, the Mastiff only has 240 bettors, or 20 different drafts, comprising the playing field.  Being overly unique isn’t as important as having a quality player stack. In 2022, the player combo with the most fantasy points overall was a Kelce-Mahomes stack. For me, this stack was a great way to start a balanced team, albeit at a steeper price than last year. I rounded my draft with an anchor running back and then smashed wide receivers, keeping in mind the star struck stack I started with. 

 

STACKING

Stacking is a well-established strategy where two or more members from the same offense are selected during a draft to maximize fantasy points. A stack typically includes a quarterback along with another offensive player. However, any combination of players may qualify. Creating a 3-player stack increases its value. Overall, I think of the strategy in two parts. 

First, stacking balances out an offense’s potential across your fantasy team. For example, you wager that the Pittsburgh Steelers are going to be better than projected. Therefore, you believe their players should do better than each of their expected ADPs. Picking up Pickett, Pickens, Harris and Johnson in your draft are great ways to invest in that specific bet. You maximize your potential to capture the most points from the Steelers offense. If you only pick up Pickens, you are unlikely to see the whole offensive picture reflect in your overall performance in the league. 

Second, stacking allows your fantasy team to capture points from different players’ spike weeks. If possible, you should plan your stacks to correlate with multiple members of the same and opposing teams. The winning ticket from BBMIII (2022) drafted three quarterbacks with at least one matching wide receiver each. The player also stacked a running back with his running quarterback. During the end of the season tournament, the bettor was able to advance to the finals due to a Daniel Jones and Saquon Barkley stack. Jones excelled one week when Barkley fell short of his projected points. The next week, Barkley spiked. Having the Jones-Barkley stack allowed this player to balance out points from each of their spike weeks. Stacks can also correlate with players on the opposite side of the ball. For example, if a game is projected to be high scoring, you may select wide receivers from either team. Your fantasy team should capture points, regardless of who ends up having the better game. 

As shown with the winning ticket last year, planning stacks to account for potential spike weeks can win you the grand prize. The 2022 champion had invested in a week 17 game by stacking 3 New England players along with players from Miami and Tampa Bay, whose teams also had high scoring games. The players on these teams were all hitting, and they saw the lion’s share of the points (161) for the week.

Should you stack? YES, but only if it comes to you naturally. Reaching within reason on ADP may be OK, but never drop a full page off ADP to capture someone just to create a stack. While you are 2-3% more likely to win your league and move on if you have a stacked team, it is not the end all be all that allows for everyone to ignore ADP, and other values, that could result in a better player at the position you are drafting. Having the best, and the right players, is still the preferred method to winning your Best Ball draft.

 

WEEK 17

The culmination of watching your team prevail weeks on end, brought you to the doorstep of greatness. Does your team have what it takes? The Best Ball tournament runs across weeks, 15, 16 and 17. Contestants must win each week to move on. The winner of week 17 wins it all. For this reason, it is imperative to focus your draft on week 17 matchups, or your team likely won’t have a shot at the grand prize. The following is a breakdown of who plays who in week 17. (Insert picture please)

 

As you can see in the photo above, the game with the highest projected score overall is Cincinnati VS Kansas City. A good rule of thumb to remember is that the more points scored in a game, the higher the fantasy points in that game. While there are outliers to this rule, 87% of the time it rings true. When choosing a game to stack during your draft, look at the proficiency of the offense, how many points will be scored in that game and how much volume does your asset have in that game. 

Ideally, a draft team will have a few stacks from the Cincinnati VS Kansas City game in week 17. However, this can be difficult to accomplish as most of their players are at the top of the draft list and get selected fast. Looking at Cincinnati, Chase is currently #2 ADP, and Higgins is typically picked up in the 2nd round. Mixon is a top running back and Burrow is top 5 quarterback, who had several weeks as QB 1 in 2022. If you can manage it, these players are all great candidates to stack with a number of Kansas City players that fall later in the draft. A great draft will correlate these teams, or teams with a similar setup in week 17. 

Here is an example of a 2023 Fast Puppy draft team. Picking from the three spot, Burrow is the quarterback stacked with Mixon, Chase, Higgins, and Boyd. Also drafted are three Kansas City running backs and three wide receivers. A few other outstanding players like Walker, Hill and McBride fill in the gaps to create a strong team that will be competitive during the season. More importantly, the team is highly correlated to the last game of the season. If this team advances to the tournament, it stands a strong chance to win week 17 overall due to being comprised of the best stacks from potentially the most explosive game of the year.

 

CONCLUSION

Best Ball is all about the draft. There is no trading or changes to be made like in redraft leagues. Once your team is locked in, your work is done. Preparation is key. Stacking increases your chances of moving on to the finals and winning the major prizes. Remember, week 17 is the most important week as it’s where the money is made. Don’t get caught in the backfield of your league, and stay up to date on the latest headlines, trends and strategies to increase your draft potential. Follow us for Best Ball tips and tricks to increase your odds of winning.