Zero Running Backs or Zero Points:

Andrew Heller, James Sohigian,

Henry Bartz, Ethan Kawahara,

Felix Wang

Zero Running Backs or

Zero Points:

An analysis on the optimal Fantasy Football draft strategy

Wharton Moneyball Academy 2022, Sports Analytics Student Research Journal

DEFINITIONS

Key terms used

● ADP = average draft position (overall)

● FPT = fantasy points total

Fantasy football: a game in which the

participants serve as owners and general

managers of virtual professional American

football teams

PPR (points per reception) data for our

model

BACKGROUND

Millions of people every year struggle with their fantasy football drafts because they often:

● Draft what is computer recommended

● Auto draft

● Draft based on subjective bias like name recognition

● Draft teams with players that are susceptible to injuries during the season

Running backs are the most susceptible players to injury… so is it even worth to draft them early?

Zero Running Back draft strategy is:

● Load up team with the top WRs, TEs, and QBs in the early rounds of the draft

● Let others pick off the ‘top’ RBs in the first five rounds

● Starting around the 6th round, draft the leftover RBs (usually consisting of high upside

players or backups that might play or can be used for trade value)

STRATEGIES EXPLAINED:

’Standard’

Common process

of subjectively

drafting

AUTO-DRAFT

Computer based

ratings

OPTIMAL STRATEGY

Whichever draft strategy used to produce teams

with the highest final season total points

ZERO-RB

Not popularly

known or used

OTHER

Other uncommon

draft strategies not

investigated

HYPOTHESIS

The Zero-RB draft strategy will prove to be more effective than the

conventional draft strategy.

• Top RBs have been proven to be injured more frequently

than other top positional players

• Stacking up on WRs, TEs, and QBs usually scores an equal

number of points as the top RBs

APEX Fantasy

Football Insider

Blog

“Our three-year

average tells us that a

top 30 running back

is likely to miss 0.86

more games per

season than a top 30

wide receiver.”

“Considering wide receivers

are scoring more points than

running backs, come at a

cheaper price, and are less

likely to get injured, I think

it’s a very good idea to take

wide receivers early. This is

the best way to give your

fantasy football team a

weekly advantage.”

RB WR TE

QB DEF

Fantasy points by draft round over different position groups

STANDARDIZED FPT BY POS,

GROUPED BY YEAR

MODEL PROCESS

1. DATA

The ADP, SD, and

average fantasy

points tables are

combined.

2. SIM

4. SORT

3. DRAFT

5. LOOP

According to various

“limits,” all 12 team draft

14 players in a snake draft.

The model is

repeated for every

position and year.

Each team’s players are

sorted and ranked by

POS and Fantasy Points.

ADP (acting as the mean)

and SD are used to generate

a random draft position.

1. DATA

2. SIMULATION

rnorm(n, mean, sd)

3. DRAFT

4. SORT

POS

DEF

5. LOOP

12 Picks

14 Rounds

100 Simulations

12 Experiments

10 Years

= 2,016,000 Picks

: Zero-RB

: Standard

strategy

: Zero-RB

: Standard

strategy

: Zero-RB

: Standard

strategy

From our data, the Zero - RB doesn’t work optimally

and it is suggested that the Fantasy Football draft

process is based primarily on luck

CONCLUSIONS

● Year to year distribution of the running

backs determines which draft strategy will

be the most viable

● Larger discrepancies between top RBs and

lesser RBs effect the Zero-RB draft strategy

effectiveness

● Random year to year variation in player

productivity changes outcomes

LIMITATIONS & FAULTS

● Excluded years 2012 and 2013 due to a lack of data for player ADPs

● Used Occam's razor for draft with assigning normal curves to players

● Elimination of positions in real life leagues like kickers

● Did not have real life data from Sleeper, ESPN, etc to ensure normality in

ADP distribution

● Trades and FAAB/Waiver Wire not accounted for

● Data was converted to a .csv and cleaned by hand so room for data

errors

https://apexfantasyleagues.com/more-injury-prone-wide-receivers-running-backs/

https://fantasydata.com/nfl/fantasy-football-

leaders?season=2020&seasontype=1&scope=1&subscope=1&scoringsystem=2&st

artweek=1&endweek=1&aggregatescope=1&range=1

https://fantasyfootballcalculator.com/adp/ppr/12-team/all

References & Resources