In 2006, Fanball 1.0 invented The Fantasy Football Pants Party Podcast, and it was good.
But after two years, TVs fell off the wall, the lights were turned off and the doors were locked.
Four years later, in what was a desperate move that ultimately paid off, 1500 ESPN tabbed the former producer of The Fantasy Football Pants Party Podcast (yours truly) to host a Sunday morning fantasy football show.
And it was also good.
After two years on the airwaves, the show returned back to its roots as a midweek podcast, adding Bo Mitchell — an original host of The Fantasy Football Pants Party Podcast — and dropping its Pants. After an additional two years, John Tuvey came aboard and the original trio from The Fantasy Football Pants Party was reunited and it felt so good.
Today, we’re bringing the party to Zone Coverage.
Throughout this preseason and the 2018 regular season, Bo, John and I will be bringing you 20 episodes of fun and helpful fantasy football analysis that will help you plan for your draft, work your waiver wire, dominate DFS and — if all goes to plan — capture a championship.
And it will be good.
We’re still working through the particulars, but hope to be recording live again each week on location so anyone who wants to come out and ask us questions on the show and enjoy a beverage with us can do so.
We’ll keep you posted on social media in that regard.
Which reminds me, if you’re not already following us on Twitter, here are the handles for your following pleasure:
We’ll also have weekly stories for you right here on Zone Coverage, which will include links to each of our .5 PPR cheat sheets — regularly updated so you can download prior to your draft with all the latest news taken into account. In fact, here they are now if you’d like to have a gander:
OK, now that we’ve got the housekeeping out of the way, how about some strategy talk, eh? We’ll talk more about this on our first preseason show, which should be posted on Wednesday night or Thursday morning. Keep an eye out for that.
Cripes — I said enough with the housekeeping. Bad Magsh. Bad! Let’s get started.
How to use ADP
Pop quiz — you can go to your draft with only a cheat sheet or ADP data from a reputable source. Which do you choose?
The answer for me is ADP, and it’s not close. Now don’t get me wrong, you should be bringing both. You’ll learn a lot by having the two to compare. But ADP is most important because it gives you an idea of when you should reasonable start thinking about taking the guys you want.
Now, this is assuming you’re doing a bit of prep work beforehand and have guys in mind you like and those you’re trying to avoid. If you’re one of those guys who does zero prep work, prints off a cheat sheet and goes and drafts, then fine. I’ll concede a cheat sheet is a way to go, assuming you’re using one that’s created for your scoring system. You could look at ADP like a crowdsourced cheat sheet, but that data is coming from leagues of all sizes and scoring systems, which can throw things out of whack.
Ultimately what I’m doing with ADP is making sure I’m not overreaching for the players I like.
For instance, let’s say I think Jordan Howard is going to be the best running back in fantasy football this season and I have the 1.01 pick. If my cheat sheet lists Howard at the top of it and I don’t know any better, then I’ll take Howard.
But if I’m looking at ADP and see Howard is going as the 33rd pick overall on average, then I know when it gets back to me at 2.12 — assuming a 12-team league — there’s a pretty good chance that I’ll be able to take Howard there.
Meanwhile, if I think Le’Veon Bell is the second-best running back, I look at ADP and see he’s the second pick, on average, then I know I’ve got to take him. So then I’ve got my Nos. 1 and 2 RBs locked in, even though I picked them in reverse order.
I’d like to note at this point that I do in fact take ADP into account when doing my own personal rankings. So my cheat sheet has this data baked into it in a way, because I don’t want anyone picking someone way ahead of where they realistically should go, even if I’m super high on that player. I just ensure that I have whoever it is ranked comfortably ahead of ADP, so it’s clear this is someone you should be aggressive on.
Green Bay wide receiver Randall Cobb is a good example of this — I like him as a WR2 this season, but have him ranked at 26th at the position. This is nine spots ahead of where he is in ADP.
If his ADP starts to rise, I’ll be moving Cobb up accordingly.
I’ve got a lot more to say when it comes to draft strategy, but that’s why I have a podcast. Make sure you subscribe and/or download so you’re ready to roll when the show is released.
Also, don’t hesitate to send us questions via Twitter. We’ll answer them online, but occasionally bring them into the show to discuss as well.
Thank you all for either checking us out for the first time or making the journey with us over from our previous home. We’re excited to have you, and excited for the 2018 season.
The Fantasy Football Party is recorded each week by John Tuvey, Bo Mitchell and Anthony Maggio. You can also find a story from one of the three each week right here at ZoneCoverage.com. Subscribe to the podcast and never miss an episode by clicking here.
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