Languish no more at poor draft day performances! Faraz has you covered with three tips to help you crush your draft this year:

1) Be Flexible

Don’t go into your draft already thinking you know exactly how you’re drafting - I’m taking a RB in the 1st, a WR in the 2nd, I’m taking WRs in the middle rounds - you just never know how the board is going to fall, and if you’re so set in your ways, you’re not even going to realize when a huge value is staring you in the face.

You have to be flexible, and be prepared to take any player at any point, and be able to adjust on the fly. It’s better that you grab that value that fell to you than sticking with your positional strategy, because your team would be off to a better start than it would’ve with your strategy. This leads into one of our next tips...

2) Understand & Separate by Tier

So let’s say you’re on the clock or about to be on the clock, and you have Christian Watson, Drake London, Terry McLaurin as choices, and let’s say you have all of them in the same tier of WR - that mid-to-low-end WR2 range. But all of a sudden, Josh Jacobs falls to you, and the next available RB is Travis Etienne. The gap between Jacobs and Etienne is huge, but the gap between those three WRs might not be as big. So Jacobs gives you the positional advantage you’re looking for here, and he should be the pick here.

Another example later in the draft: Miles Sanders, Dameon Pierce, and Cam Akers are all on the board for you to choose from, but then Calvin Ridley falls to you - the next best WR after Ridley in this particular draft is, let’s say, Chris Godwin - you’re like alright, I have Ridley a lot higher than Godwin, but those RBs are all in a similar tier - and you know what, I’m also near the turn, there’s actually a chance one of those guys makes it back around to me, but there’s almost no chance Ridley makes it back to me - Ridley is the pick there.

These might seem like obvious examples, but I’m just trying to make a point of how you can approach these types of situations.

And by the way, we’re making these picks regardless of whether our starting lineup is filled or not. I’m drafting the best possible RBs and WRs regardless of whether I need a RB2 - if the value at WR is better at that spot, I’m drafting the WR - they can go into my flex or they can go into my WR3 spot. Same the other way around; and I’m even ok with filling out a bench spot or two if those players are that much better than the starting lineup spot I need to fill on my roster, especially at QB and TE.

3) Don't Reach... Except When at the Turn

And that brings us to our next point, which is not to reach - but I do think there’s an exception, and I’ll get to that. When I’m picking near the middle of the round, I don’t want to reach several players ahead of ADP because there’s a chance that that player could make his way back to me in the next round. Just that possibility is good enough reason to take another player who’s almost as valuable in your eyes, and have a chance at that player coming back to you in the next round, because you will have just doubled up on the value that you wanted.

But I will say that if you’re dead set on getting a guy, and you hate all the guys ahead of him… sure, whatever. Go ahead and reach. But if you do take that player, chances are you’re also going to hate the players at the top of the board in the next round, so might as well have picked a better player from your shit list than to get the worst player on that shit list in the next round.

I think if you’re at the turn, you have some permission to reach. You kind of just get your guys. I’m personally comfortable at the turn - whether that’s at the 1.01 or the 1-2 turn because I have my guys. I know who I want, and I’m fine going and getting them - but if I’m not at the turn, I’m usually trying my best to not reach a whole lot. When I reach a couple of times, I tend to have limited choices a little later in my draft and I’m usually not super happy with my team.