Also, keep in mind that changing keeper league rules can often lead to problems. My advice: Once you get a robust system, keep it stable. Specifically, you should rarely change starting lineup requirements.
If you do, you change the approach that owners—who are thinking long term—have taken when drafting and choosing their keepers. Changing lineup requirements could cause years of strategy for someone to go out the window.
Spend plenty of time thinking about your keeper rules before starting. Make sure everyone has been able to give input and that you have a good solid basis from the beginning. This can help you keep things stable for the future, and help avoid angering owners later with rule changes that hurt their existing strategies.
If you must make changes to the league, do it collectively and give ample time for the new rules to go into effect. For example, if the league decides to change to a superflex format able to use a quarterback in the flex position , make the rule change go into effect two full seasons after the decision is made. This will allow owners to adjust their strategy over time. Remember, long-term leagues require long-term planning. There are a few tried and true methods to decide what players should stay on teams and how rosters will be managed:.
Salary cap based on years. Each team has a maximum roster of 16 players with a year salary cap. After the draft is complete, you will assign years to your players.
Be very careful assigning years because injuries and bye weeks will inevitably force you to make a move during the season. Solid planning and foresight is key to salary cap leagues. You want to have flexibility with your cap so you aren't forced to cut someone to get a starting lineup filled for a given week. At the end of the year, you are allowed to sign one player on your roster to an extension for as many years as you want.
Here's a strategy tip: Sign young stars to long-term contracts while signing backups and aging stars to one- or two-year contracts. Also, leave one year available on your salary cap for flexibility and allow an Injured Reserved spot so you can carry 16 active and one inactive player.
Keep Players. This option is much easier if you don't want to keep track of salary caps and possible cap violations. Before the next season begins, owners determine which players to keep from their player roster. This method is good for keeper league beginners.
It's easier to manage and redrafts will have more available talent. More often then not, parity in the league is a good thing. Round penalties. Keep a set number of players, or as many players as you want to, but each player counts as a draft pick in your draft.
Typically, a player drafted in the fifth round the previous year would then count as a fourth-round pick the current season.
This makes keeping players a value proposition instead of a simple choice of who the best players are on the roster. It also limits the number of players that can be kept who are drafted in the first few rounds every year.
This system is a favorite for many keeper league owners because it tends to reward owners who hit big on late draft picks, and tends to allow the top players in the league to shuffle a little more season-to-season, increasing parity while rewarding those who really know their stuff. Keep all players. This is called a dynasty league. The draft consists only of rookies and teams carry over all or most players. This format is growing in popularity, and 4for4 has a ton of new dynasty content worth checking out.
Scoring is no different in keeper leagues than redraft leagues. Standard scoring, point per reception, TE-premium or any other scoring format will work. Owners should know the scoring system before draft day so they have ample time to prepare for the draft, and the scoring system should remain the same each season to avoid kept players losing or gaining value based on a scoring change.
Starting lineups also vary, but a typical keeper league starting lineup will follow that of more traditional leagues:. Your first draft order will be randomly determined and should follow the snake draft pattern.
Conversely, you could hold an auction. Following-year drafts typically reward the worst teams in the first two rounds: The worst team will get the first pick of round one and first pick of round two. After the first and second rounds are complete, round three will start the snake draft. So, the champion of the league would get the last pick in rounds one and two and the first pick in round three. To discourage people from purposely losing games to get the top pick in the draft, you may want to implement a draft lottery such as the following:.
The draft lottery determines which non-playoff teams will get the first three picks. Once that is resolved, the draft will go in order of worst regular season record.
For playoff teams, the draft order will be determined by where they finished in the playoffs. Regular season records should be used as a tiebreaker. No matter how you do it, coming up with a method that is equitable and agreed upon by all owners is important before the first draft. If you wait until later, you may find it much harder to get owners to agree upon a method for slotting when they have something on the line. A waiver wire process, however, is good if you want to allow a more equitable system for picking up players.
You can slot waiver wire priority by record each week, overall record, or by random generation. You can also choose to allow owners to keep their waiver slot from week-to-week.
Once an owner makes a successful waiver wire claim, they move down to the last priority position. Another option would be to adopt a free agent acquisition budget FAAB system, where each team is allotted a certain amount of funny money for the season to place blind bids on free agents. Both methods are common and 4for4 offers subscribers waiver wire advice every week to help you navigate your rules. You will also need to establish rules that govern keeping a waiver wire mid-season addition.
If your keeper league has round penalties for keeping players, and an owner wants to keep a player acquired off the waiver wire the season before, there needs to be an agreed-upon penalty for these players.
Sometimes, leagues put a standard mid-round pick on waiver additions. In other leagues, strategic owners who work the waiver wire all year are rewarded with the ability to keep waiver additions by surrendering only the last round selection in the draft.
However you decide to handle waiver wire additions, ensure that all owners are in agreement before the first season begins. It's sad that you have to even think about collusion and cheating, but the reality is it can happen. You don't want people colluding together to make a super team. Often, these underhanded owners have an agreement that the winnings will be split based on the super team's performance. This is especially harmful in a keeper league, as the super team can carry over for multiple seasons, hurting the competitive balance of the league and causing other owners to lose interest.
To prevent collusion or questionable trades you need firm trade rules. A suggested rule is that anyone may challenge a trade, but once a trade is challenged, it goes to a vote where, depending on how many people are involved, the trade can be canceled by the remaining owners in the league not directly involved in the trade.
Player dumping is another method of cheating. This happens when an owner cuts a player so another team can pick them up. An owner may be lured to do this for monetary compensation. To prevent this, consider using some sort of a no-cut list. Ultimately, if you ever suspect an owner of player dumping, give them a warning. If the player dumping continues, boot the owner from the league immediately.
Keeper leagues often tend to be much more emotional than any redraft league. Here are just a few reasons why:. You want motivated owners to put their best lineups in every week. They must understand everyone cannot win every year.
The good news is keeper leagues tend to be very cyclical, meaning everyone will eventually have their chance to shine. Typically, a player drafted in the fifth round the previous year would then count as a fourth-round pick the current season. This makes keeping players a value proposition instead of a simple choice of who the best players are on the roster. It also limits the number of players that can be kept who are drafted in the first few rounds every year. This system is a favorite for many keeper league managers because it tends to reward managers who hit big on late draft picks, and tends to allow the top players in the league to shuffle a little more season-to-season, increasing parity while rewarding those who really know their stuff.
Your first draft order will be randomly determined and should follow the snake draft pattern. Conversely, you could hold a salary cap draft.
Following-year drafts typically reward the worst teams in the first two rounds: The worst team will get the first pick of Round 1 and first pick of Round 2. After the first and second rounds are complete, Round 3 will start the snake draft. So, the champion of the league would get the last pick in Rounds and the first pick in Round 3. To discourage people from purposely losing games to get the top pick in the draft, you may want to implement a draft lottery such as the following:. The draft lottery determines which non-playoff teams will get the first three picks.
Once that is resolved, the draft will go in order of worst regular-season record. For playoff teams, the draft order will be determined by where they finished in the playoffs. Regular season records should be used as a tiebreaker. No matter how you do it, coming up with a method that is equitable and agreed upon by all managers is important before the first draft.
If you wait until later, you may find it much harder to get managers to agree upon a method for slotting when they have something on the line. You will also need to establish rules that govern keeping a waiver wire mid-season addition. If your keeper league has round penalties for keeping players, and a manager wants to keep a player acquired off the waiver wire the season before, there needs to be an agreed-upon penalty for these players.
Sometimes, leagues put a standard mid-round pick on waiver additions. In other leagues, strategic managers who work the waiver wire all year are rewarded with the ability to keep waiver additions by surrendering only the last round selection in the draft. However you decide to handle waiver wire additions, ensure that all managers are in agreement before the first season begins, and 4for4 offers subscribers waiver wire advice every week to help you navigate your rules.
Often, trades are more important in keeper leagues than in redraft leagues. In keeper leagues, you can often ride one good decision for years. Keeper leagues provide you with a little more flexibility when it comes to trading, as you now are able to trade future draft picks. In most cases, no one player is worth more than one first-round pick. Future first-round picks are very valuable commodities because they enable you to grab potential superstar rookies and solid veteran players.
Conversely, middle- and late-round picks hold less value in a keeper league. Most keeper leagues will have, at a minimum, the top veteran players off the board before the draft begins. This means that drafting early is often about nabbing the top rookies. Never overestimate a player's worth. Imagine a manager wanting a player so much they trade three future first-round picks to acquire him? It does happen. Although you may love a player and even own his jersey, don't go out of your way to mortgage your team's future to get him.
Production is what matters. Remember, you're a general manager, so run your team like one. Also, keep in mind that retirement, injuries, and declining fantasy productivity will constantly alter the dynamics of your keeper league.
Fantasy teams who were once strong may become the laughingstock of the entire league, and weaker teams may suddenly become dominant. Good management and talent evaluation are crucial in keeper leagues. The beauty of keeper leagues is that there is no one right strategy. However, there are three tried-and-true strategies managers can look to:. This article is updated from an original article written by guest contributor Marc Hess and originally appeared in its full form on 4for4.
Brandon has been a regular contributor to 4for4 since In dynasty leagues, you need to zig when others zag and zag when others zig. You have the ability to be patient in these formats. Yes, it might be tough to wait two to three years for it all to pay off, but remember, this league goes on for many many years in your ideal scenario. Waiting three years to unleash a loaded roster -- all reaching their prime at the same time -- is better than almost winning your fantasy championship.
Like Ricky Bobby says, " If you ain't first, you're last. ADP average draft position is still something to be mindful of, but it's less essential in a dynasty league. Yes, you don't want to reach for a player who you could've gotten rounds later, but your team's makeup is going to be different depending on your strategy.
If you're on the clock with the first pick in the third round, where Austin Ekeler is going via Dynasty Calculator ADP , he might be a super attractive option or someone you're completely avoiding. Chances are, he's not going to be fantasy relevant for too many more years, and if you're building for the future, you may opt for a Travis Etienne or Javonte Williams just a few spots later in ADP.
Those are the decisions you're going to be challenged to make. What you don't want to do is be stuck with half aging vets and half rookie projects who are going to take time to develop. This will lead you to a classic middling finish, and it's likely you'll have to do a lot of work on the trade market to reshape your team. These tips aren't to say that you should take all rookies. You need veterans for depth and provide some production while the young players develop.
Often, you can get solid bridge players in the middle to late parts of the draft. Cheap and productive veterans are valuable to fill places in your roster, but they won't likely have much trade value going forward. If you're in an extreme tank-for-the-future mode, you might just opt to ditch the veterans, taking young upside at all available spots.
An essential key to dynasty success is knowing when to make moves on the trade market. You have to get out from underneath fantasy assets that are about to fall off, especially if you aren't in contention for a championship. There is a wide variety of perspectives as to when to sell players. A popular sell is a running back on his second contract. As we know, when running backs fall off, they fall off hard.
Of course, they are exceptions, but often, as running backs continue to take wear and take over four to five NFL seasons, they eventually fall off. That's not to say these running backs can't still be worthwhile starters in fantasy, but their dynasty prospects are much grimmer than they once were.
Take a guy like Derrick Henry. We saw what he did the first year of his new contract with an explosive 2,yard rushing season. However, assuming he's available, he's not someone you necessarily want to target early in a dynasty start-up draft unless you're all-in for Year 1.
Can we really expect him to continue his pace for the next handful of seasons? It's a safe bet to say no. Instead, rookie and second-year running backs have much higher long-term upside. Contrary to conventional redraft strategy, now might be the time to consider selling Henry. Wide receivers have a little bit more shelf life, with their primes usually ranging anywhere between age For this example, we'll use Keenan Allen.
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