FanDuel roster advice: There’s no one way to do this
Some like to advocate splurging on a quarterback. Some say to spend on receiver. The truth is that all of these are good advice, and all are bad. A good roster is a good roster is a good roster.
Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports
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There’s no one way to build a roster for FanDuel fantasy football. I’ve seen winners that frontloaded with wide receivers or with running backs and found bargains elsewhere, and I’ve seen winners that found middle-of-the-road options across the board.
To illustrate that, this week I’m showcasing three of my rosters. I’m entering all these rosters into the same contest this weekend, so we can see together how it shakes out. For the first roster, I splurged on quarterback. For the second, I went more middle-of-the-road. And for the third, I went cheap. Each strategy created some other opportunities or crunches on the roster, but ... You know what, just look at the rosters and we’ll go from there:
The first thing you should notice is that, for all three quarterbacks, I found a pass-catcher to pair him with (Rob Gronkowski with Tom Brady, Odell Beckham Jr. with Eli Manning, Delanie Walker with Marcus Mariota). Note that these are rosters for a tournament, and not a cash game or 50/50 or some such; games with more winners (but lower prizes) don't really force you to stack options like that, but in a tournament, you need to capitalize, and that means pairing a quarterback and a pass-catcher.
After that, some of the alternative become clear. On the roster where I saved at quarterback with Mariota, I could parlay those savings into the No. 1 receiver (Julio Jones), No. 2 running back (Le'Veon Bell) and two more quasi-elite options in Todd Gurley and Keenan Allen. Conversely, when I splurged on Brady and Gronkowski, I made it work with Demaryius Thomas and Eddie Lacy, but only by going super low-end on Anthony Dixon, who should have the Buffalo starting job Sunday. Problem is, if Karlos Williams clears the concussion protocol, I'll have to change that out, and lord knows there are very few other $4,500 running backs with much to offer.
I like all three of these rosters. If I had to commit to one of them, it would probably be the Brady-Gronkowski one, just because that pairing has been unbeatable this year. Some level of success out of all three wouldn’t really shock me, though.
Like I said, there’s no one way to make a FanDuel roster. It’s just a matter of making your preferred method in a given game work for you.
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