So this league is a keeper league. You get to keep one player for the cost of where you drafted them last year minus one round (minimum of an 8th rounder for waiver pickups and late picks). I decided to use my 4th round pick to keep Matthew Stafford. Unfortunately, I had the first pick of the fourth round, so I didn't get super good value there, but I did still get him a couple picks later than he's been going according to Yahoo and ESPN's ADP. I could have had C.J. Spiller for pick 60 (ADP is 45) or Jordan Cameron in the 8th (pick 85, ADP somewhere between 53 and 70 depending where you look). Maybe I should have gone for one of the other guys, but I just don't want to deal with Spiller should he face nagging injuries again and I'm not super high on Cameron given he had 7 games with 4 or fewer points and 9 games with 6 or fewer last year, wasn't particularly great in the second half of last season and faces questions surrounding his team's QB situation. I went with the safe(ish) guy.
The league is a standard scoring, standard lineup, snake draft league and I have pick 12 of 12.
Round 1 - Demaryius Thomas - WR - Den
Once again, I'm happy to spend a late first round pick on the WR who is second on my WR board.
Round 2 - Arian Foster - RB - Hou
I thought about going with a second elite WR (A.J., Dez, and Julio were all still available), but knowing that 22 players would be gone before I get to pick again, I decided that I would need to get a solid RB here. After the top 6 RBs are gone, I don't think there is such a thing, but regardless, I decided to gamble on Arian's back and hamstrings.
Round 3 - Andre Johnson - WR - Hou
Going into his 12th season, Andre has probably lost a step or two, but if he could get 1400 yds and 5 TDs in an offense as mediocre as Houston's was last year, I'm ok spending a late 3rd rounder on the guy.
Round 4 - Matthew Stafford - QB - Det
I'm expecting 4500 yds and 30+ TDs. I'm OK with this value given how highly this league tends to value QBs (once again, 3 were gone by the end of the 3rd).
Round 5 - Roddy White - WR - Atl
What can I say? I got him in almost the same spot as in my other league interestingly enough.
Round 6 - Steven Jackson - RB - Atl
What's not to love about a starting RB in the 6th round?
Round 7 - Jeremy Hill - RB - Cin
I think he gets 30-40% of the work in Cincy this year. And if Gio falters or gets hurt, Jeremy Hill could produce quite nicely.
Round 8 - Bernard Pierce - RB - Bal
Just stockpiling RB depth here. I don't think Pierce is amazing by any means, but could have value should something happen to Rice.
Round 9 - Mike Evans - WR - TB
I believe they call this "taking a flier." He's a big dude who can make plays. Shouldn't see too much double coverage with Vincent Jackson lining up on the other side of the field.
Round 10 - Russel Wilson - QB - Sea
I don't necessarily feel like I need a backup QB, but getting last year's #8 fantasy QB (and I don't see any reason for a large regression) this late is just too good of a value to pass up. The couple TEs I had been looking at didn't fall to me either, so it was an easy call to make.
Round 11 - Delanie Walker - TE - Ten
I think I was the last person to draft my TE and a couple had taken backups, so I picked Delanie out of the scrap pile.
Round 12 - Chris Ivory - RB - NYJ
More RB depth. This is sort of pick-your-favorite-medium-upside-backup territory.
Round 13 - KC DST
Since I'll be having the last pick in the draft, I figured I might as well get D and Kicker a hair early again. KC was hot last year. Don't think they'll repeat what they did last year, but there were half a dozen defenses already taken.
Round 14 - Adam Vinatieri - K - Ind
Round 15 - Christine Michael - RB - Sea
(see Ivory, Chris)
My Starting Roster
QB: Stafford
RB1: Foster
RB2: S. Jackson
WR1: D. Thomas
WR2: A. Johnson
Flex: R. White
TE: D. Walker
D/ST: KC
K: Vinatieri
B: J. Hill
B: B. Pierce
B: M. Evans
B: R. Wilson
B: C. Ivory
B: C. Michael
I'm pretty happy with this lineup. If every team owner came up to me and asked "would you like to swap teams" I would answer "sure, why not?" to probably 4 of them. One of which would border on "yes, please." I think I look good to be in the playoff hunt, assuming last years injury bug doesn't come back and bite me again. In hindsight, I perhaps should have just kept Cameron. Considering what was left at TE when the 8th round came around, Cameron would have looked amazing. I probably wouldn't have been able to still get Stafford in the 4th, but my RB situation would probably look a bit better and I'd still have found a good value at QB. Unfortunately, our keeper picks were due right around the time training camps started up and I forgot about the due date and wasn't able to put a ton of research or thought into the decision at the time.
