Expert DRAFTing Week 8

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DRAFT offers weekly snake draft contests with 5-man rosters (1 QB, 2 RB, 2 WR/TE) with 0.5-point PPR scoring (the same as FanDuel). There is no salary cap on DRAFT which makes it unique to how you play compared to the other daily fantasy sites. Teams are built through live snake drafts that have 30-second timer per pick. The most common contest sizes are Head-to-Head, 3-Team, 6-Team, and 10-Team.

We will explore both the rankings and draft strategies for each of these four DRAFT sizes. To understand why players are ranked where they are, be sure to check out the overall rankings where I will have in-depth breakdowns of some of the top options and some personal favorites down the list. When developing these rankings we will be excluding the Thursday Night, Sunday Night, and Monday Night games and only focus on the main slate on DRAFT, which is the Sunday games.

WEEK 8 - QUICK NEWS AND NOTES

It is Week 8 and that means we have Baltimore and Dallas on bye weeks. Now with two bye weeks our player pool is left with 12 games to choose from on the main slate. DRAFT has excluded the Washington vs Minnesota, Green Bay vs Kansas City, and Miami vs Pittsburgh games because they are not on the main Sunday slate. That still leaves us 12 games and 24 teams worth of players to choose from this week. This will be a good week to try all the different sized formats on DRAFT and to play in the four different tournament options that they have available.

• Third and Short - 6-man $3 (6 max)
• Hype Train - 7-man $5 (7 max)
• First and Ten- 4-man $10 (4 max)
• Five Wide - 4-man $55 (4 max)

The popular high scoring game to target this week is going to be Seattle vs Atlanta (53.5 O/U). The next two highest over/under is Oakland vs Houston (51.5), and NY Giants vs Detroit (49.5). Whenever you are in a position to choose between two players you feel have similar upside you might just want to choose the one that is from the highest total on the week as they all seem to ones that will have some high scores and lots of fantasy points from all the star players involved.

The running back and wide receiver depth this week is strong so you might not see as much edge in the smaller sized leagues such as H2H, 3-man, or 4-man. Anything above a 4-man I feel like you can use your rankings and draft skills to give you a nice edge over your competition in Week 8. Even in H2H, 3-man, and 4-man, you will always have others that will just side with DRAFT's projections and you can use that to your advantage.

Injuries are more in play now with players getting banged up after seven weeks of action. You will want to be monitoring news leading up to kickoff and be ready for any last-minute swaps if necessary.

HEAD-TO-HEAD DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY

1. Christian McCaffrey RB1
2. Saquon Barkley RB2 -- Questionable
3. Leonard Fournette RB3
4. Michael Thomas WR1
5. DeAndre Hopkins WR2
6. Deshaun Watson QB1
7. Chris Godwin WR3
8. Chris Carson RB4
9. Julio Jones WR4
10. Russell Wilson QB2

For a head-to-head contest you need to look for the top 2 quarterbacks, 4 running backs, and 4 wide receivers/tight ends - For a total of 10 players. The main key to look at when drafting in H2H contests is to know what your opponent is doing. You want to watch if he takes WR/WR to start the draft you know that you can draft your WR positions with your last two picks. Same goes if he drafts a QB or RB/RB, you know that you can leverage that information and wait at those positions.

In H2H drafts I typically come in with a game plan and like to stick closely to it, and let the other drafter I am up against decide what type of team I will build depending on their picks. Often you will find others that like to draft their favorite team, maybe they just follow DRAFT's projections/ADP and stick to those numbers just going down the list. This week we have some high end running backs at the top of the draft so it might be ideal to try to get two early and build around them.

3-TEAM DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY

1. Christian McCaffrey RB1
2. Saquon Barkley RB2 -- Questionable
3. Leonard Fournette RB3
4. Michael Thomas WR1
5. DeAndre Hopkins WR2
6. Deshaun Watson QB1
7. Chris Godwin WR3
8. Chris Carson RB4
9. LeVeon Bell RB5
10. Julio Jones WR4
11. Russell Wilson QB2
12. Cooper Kupp WR5
13. Nick Chubb RB6
14. Mike Evans WR6
15. Jared Goff QB3

For the 3-man contests, you will need to look at ranking 15 total players consisting of 3 quarterbacks, 6 running backs, and 6 wide receivers/tight ends.

The best advice for drafting in 3-mans would be to come up with your solid 15 player ranking list that you feel most comfortable with and don't get frustrated if the top players that you have on that list get taken right before your pick. If you have picks 1.01 or 1.03 you will be picking at the turn and can have an advantage in following your league mates roster construction closely and be able to know when to take certain positions or if you wanted to stack players you will have an easier time doing so with back to back picks.

6-TEAM DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY

1. Christian McCaffrey RB1
2. Saquon Barkley RB2 -- Questionable
3. Leonard Fournette RB3
4. Michael Thomas WR1
5. DeAndre Hopkins WR2
6. Deshaun Watson QB1
7. Chris Godwin WR3
8. Chris Carson RB4
9. LeVeon Bell RB5
10. Julio Jones WR4
11. Russell Wilson QB2
12. Cooper Kupp WR5
13. Nick Chubb RB6
14. Mike Evans WR6
15. Todd Gurley RB7
16. Marlon Mack RB8
17. Tyler Lockett WR7
18. TY Hilton WR8
19. Josh Jacobs RB9
20. Derrick Henry RB10
21. Sony Michel RB11
22. Jared Goff QB3
23. Allen Robinson WR9
24. Julian Edelman WR10
25. Kenny Golladay WR11
26. Josh Allen QB4
27. Tom Brady QB5
28. Keenan Allen WR12
29. Devonta Freeman RB12
30. Matthew Stafford QB6

This week is mixed at the top with both running backs and wide receivers with no real star at the top that stands out above the rest. McCaffrey, Barkley, Carson and Fournette all make equally great plays so getting a top 4 pick can land you one of these and help you build around them. At wide receiver it is similar with Thomas, Hopkins, Godwin and Kupp at the top as they are all great options and not one jumps off the page more than another.

10-TEAM DRAFT RANKINGS AND STRATEGY

1. Christian McCaffrey RB1
2. Saquon Barkley RB2 -- Questionable
3. Leonard Fournette RB3
4. Michael Thomas WR1
5. DeAndre Hopkins WR2
6. Deshaun Watson QB1
7. Chris Godwin WR3
8. Chris Carson RB4
9. LeVeon Bell RB5
10. Julio Jones WR4
11. Russell Wilson QB2
12. Cooper Kupp WR5
13. Nick Chubb RB6
14. Mike Evans WR6
15. Todd Gurley RB7
16. Marlon Mack RB8
17. Tyler Lockett WR7
18. TY Hilton WR8
19. Josh Jacobs RB9
20. Derrick Henry RB10
21. Sony Michel RB11
22. Jared Goff QB3
23. Allen Robinson WR9
24. Julian Edelman WR10
25. Kenny Golladay WR11
26. Josh Allen QB4
27. Tom Brady QB5
28. Keenan Allen WR12
29. Devonta Freeman RB12
30. Matthew Stafford QB6
31. Odell Beckham WR13
32. Courtland Sutton WR14
33. DJ Chark WR15
34. Robert Woods WR16
35. Phillip Lindsay RB13
36. Marvin Jones WR17
37. Tyler Lockett WR18
38. George Kittle WR/TE19
39. Melvin Gordon RB14
40. Austin Ekeler RB15
41. Chase Edmonds RB16
42. Tevin Coleman RB17
43. Latavius Murray RB18 (Check Alvin Kamara news)
44. Jameis Winston QB7
45. Jacoby Brissett QB8
46. Kyler Murray QB9
47. Joe Mixon RB19
48. Royce Freeman RB20
49. John Brown WR20
50. Daniel Jones QB10

Stacking is something you will want to look at in these 10-man leagues as you will be looking for advantages to put up big points and get on top of the leaderboard. You can look to stack a QB/WR from the same team or if you are attacking a certain game you can try to draft players from both teams. In the 10-man leagues, you are shooting to win it of course but these leagues offer top-three prizes to land in the money. Even finishing in third place out of 10 teams can be a very profitable outcome so building a team with a high floor with a couple of high ceiling type players and a possible stack can help you get there.

The 10-mans are always full of quality players even in the last couple of rounds at the start of the season. There are more games to choose from, players are healthy, and we have known the news for weeks leading up to the games. Week 8 is a great time to play 10-man drafts as you can find an edge in the 31-50 player rankings and find that perfect QB/WR stack you like to take you over the top.

If you want to follow me on DRAFT my username is "Eaglezzz" as I sometimes will post contests and would love to play along with fellow Footballguys like yourselves. Please feel free to contact me on Twitter with any questions or if you would like to discuss this article or draft strategies. I welcome constructive feedback on the article.

As always best of luck in this week's DRAFTs!