Fantasy Football Strategy. Drafting From The 1.04 In 2023.

Congrats, you’ve gotten the four slot this year, the ole 1.04. You’re inside the top five but not showing off like those 1.01 and 1.02 people.

With WRs going so early, choosing from the four-spot this season is a great position to have fall in your lap. We’re early enough to get a crack at one of the tier 1 names at that position and also in a great spot to take advantage of any slip-ups or mistakes by the first couple of drafters.

Plus, we get preference over 1.01-1.03 spots in the later rounds, which gives us more control over the rest of our roster. All-in-all, it’s a great time to be alive.

Let’s start this draft journey by debating which elite name gets to be chosen at 1.04 and anchor our lineups in 2023.

Cooper Kupp > Tyreek Hill

Yes. There will be situations where you luck out, and Justin Jefferson or Ja’marr Chase fall to you in this spot. You don’t need me to tell you that if you get a shot at one of these studs you take it — and then brag about your good fortune at the next family dinner.

However, let’s assume you're drafting with normal people who are using the free Fantasy Life projections and ADP rankings to guide them. Those people won’t let you have Chase or Jefferson at 1.04 so, in reality, picking from the 1.04 becomes a three-man race.

As much as I like Austin Ekeler, I think he’s closer to the Tier 2 RBs than Tier 1. We do have the top two RBs projected very closely, but McCaffrey’s usage upon arriving in San Francisco was elite — he ranked first in team target share and targets per route run among all RBs. A full year in the Shanahan offense gives him scary upside.

That said, I would still be OK passing on McCaffrey even if he falls to the four spot. That’s because Cooper Kupp exists.

There are concerns with Kupp on the injury front that I get, but it’s tough to deny that he doesn’t have the same kind of upside that Chase and Jefferson give you when looking at his production from last season.

Targets

Obviously the youthful upside of Jefferson and Chase — and Kupp's injury history — leave those two ranked ahead of him, but it’s not reason enough for me to drop Kupp any lower than third in the overall ranks.

While Tyreek Hill's week-to-week upside remains immense, Kupp didn’t just beat Hill in volume in 2022 — catching nearly a ball more per game than him on a per-game basis — but he had a far better TD rate as well.

It’s a small sample, but over the first five weeks of 2022, Kupp finished as a top-five WR four times and was only worse than WR20 once. Hill only produced three top-five weeks in that span and ranked outside the top-20 twice. Hill also only had one top-five WR finish in his final eight games of 2022 — slightly concerning.

When we look at team makeup, nothing has changed for the Rams. Cooper Kupp is the man. In fact, the situation in 2023 may be even better for Kupp’s upside given the state of the Rams' defense, which ranked 18th in DVOA last season and figures be to a lot worse this year.

Given that Kupp’s redraft ADP is now in the 7.0 range after a preseason injury (he’s due back practicing this week) we’re almost always going to get a crack at him at the 1.04, making him the preferred target.

The 2-3/4-5 Turns. Load the boat at WR and nab an elite QB

Tony Pollard would probably be the one exception to this plan. If he falls to us at 21, then grabbing him in this landing spot is a great bargain and gives you a balanced start that will let you be more flexible on your next pick.

Pollard’s ADP is sitting around 19.0 in our wholistic site average, so that scenario isn't going to happen often. The other temptation is to try and a catch a falling knife with Jonathan Taylor, who has yet to report to camp.

The upside of Taylor is obvious, but the downside of enduring a holdout or getting an unmotivated player who needs conditioning time can be season-ending in redraft leagues where fast starts are essential.

The alternative is far more appealing. Double-dipping at WR with our first two picks gives us a great base to work off and also the chance at landing two top-five WRs in our first two picks. Chris Olave and Devonta Smith both had breakout campaigns in 2022, with Smith finishing as WR9 in full PPR scoring.

Olave ranked sixth in air yards and fifth in air yards team share in 2022 and gets a QB upgrade for 2023. He’s the preferred target.

After going WR-WR to start, we obviously have a great WR base to work off but need to be more positionally focused with our next few picks. My main goal after starting like this would be to leave rounds 3-5 with:

Top-8 QB
RB
Another WR (preferably in Round 5)

Rhamondre Stevenson would be ideal at 34 in the third round, as the WR crew that hangs out in that ADP range is strong, but there is also similar upside available at that position in Round 5 with Brandon Aiyiuk, Diontae Johnson and Chris Godwin. If Stevenson is gone, I don’t mind firing another WR bullet on Christian Watson or DJ Moore and then taking another stab at RB in the form of Breece Hall or Travis Etienne in Round 4.

If we do get Stevenson, the goal would be Justin Fields in Round 4 and one of the previously mentioned value WRs in Round 5. If we have to wait on QB until the fifth, then we hope and pray Justin Herbert is there. Otherwise we’re looking at a two-QB approach that likely involves Anthony Richardson — not a bad emergency plan.

A quick note on drafting QBs for 2022. I’m stealing this from Chris Allen’s great piece on how to handle the 1.03 slot because it exemplifies why grabbing a QB in Rounds 3-5 is so powerful. We get a lot of the same upside as the first- and second-round QBs but at a cheaper valuation that allows us to hammer home our initial strategy of trying to land two elite WRs with our first two picks.

As mentioned above, the quarterbacks we want to target in Rounds 3-5 aren’t plentiful, so being aggressive isn’t a poor idea. Justin Fields would be the optimal target, but Justin Hebert in Round 5 also feels like a great pickup given the installation of Kellon Moore at OC for Los Angeles.

Darren Waller and polishing off the RBs 6-9

How we handle Rounds 6-9 will obviously be somewhat dependent on whether we land a quarterback, but if Darren Waller is available in Round 6 there is no decision to be made.

RB is the true focus of this range, as we need to make up for ignoring the position early with some good later-round values. Cam Akers took nearly all of his team’s red zone carries inside the 5-yard line last year and has no competition for that role in 2023. If Waller is gone at 69, Getting Akers as our RB2 gives us good stability and solid week-to-week TD upside.

Both Rachaad White and D’Andre Swift are the kind of ceiling targets in this range who could really make the early-round WR approach take off. White is a great receiving back who looks primed for a 65%+ snap rate this year. Swift is playing in the best rushing offense in the league and surely has a chip on his shoulder after being thrown to the scrap heap by the Lions after two seasons.

From an ADP standpoint, all three RBs standout as good values in our current rankings.

For Round 9, we can add to our RB depth with tandem backs like Antonio Gibson, Zach Charbonnet and Samaje Perine — who also have good receiving upside for PPR formats. Our other option is to address TE if we missed on Waller in the form of Pat Freiermuth, whose TD totals could rise substantially in 2023 with an improved Kenny Pickett.

The later rounds – more RB depth with solid handcuffs

The later rounds of the draft all depend on how our initial plan unfolded. If we missed out on a top-eight quarterback, then Daniel Jones and Geno Smith are two options to use on their own or in tandem with a pure upside play like Anthony Richardson.

Since we expended a lot of early draft capital on our WRs, I wouldn’t want to be wasting bench spots on high-floor, low-ceiling players at that position. Names like Jonathan Mingo and Alec Pierce are the perfect later-round grabs with weekly upside who we could use to fill out the position. Mingo played on 28 of the 32 snaps Bryce Young was under center in the first two weeks of preseason and could develop into a true WR2-3 by mid-year.

At RB, grabbing high-upside handcuffs like Jaylen Warren or Tank Bigsby in the 11th or 12th would help make up for avoiding the position early on.

Building from the 1.04

Below is a hypothetical team that I constructed drafting from the 1.04 spot using the guide outlined above and average ADP Underdog Fantasy.

Round 1 (Pick 4) - Cooper Kupp
Round 2 (Pick 21) - DeVonta Smith
Round 3 (Pick 34) - Rhamondre Stevenson
Round 4 (Pick 45) - Justin Fields
Round 5 (Pick 52) - Brandon Aiyuk
Round 6 (Pick 69) - Cam Akers
Round 7 (Pick 76) - Rashaad White
Round 8 (Pick 93) - Isiah Pacheco
Round 9 (Pick 100) - Pat Freiermuth
Round 10 (Pick 119) - Dalton Kincaid
Round 11 (Pick 124) - Jaylen Warren
Round 12 (Pick 143) - Jonathan Mingo
Round 13 (Pick 146) - Alec Pierce
Round 14 (Pick 167) - Kenny Pickett

We followed the blueprint and most guys are picked at their current ADP or a little earlier. Getting Darren Waller at 69 might be a pipe dream after his preseason debut, so I followed the RB path there with Akers and made up for the lack of an elite TE by grabbing the reliable Freiermuth and some rookie upside with Dalton Kincaid.

Things would also look a lot different if we don’t give ourselves Rhamondre Stevenson in the third round, but given that his hype has cooled after Ezekiel Elliott signed with the Patriots, getting him at 34 is pretty realistic for now.

I rounded things out with two high-end receivers but could certainly justify taking a shot with another RB like Tyjae Spears who brings similar high-end handcuff value that our 124 pick brings in Jaylen Warren.

Overall, I love the structure that going WR-WR early from this slot gives you. By taking care of the receivers early, we get to take a swing at a top-eight quarterback and potentially land a home run if we get Waller in the sixth. It also allows us to take advantage of a great pocket of RB value between Rounds 5-8.

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