I’ve played fantasy baseball for nearly 30 years, and I would be embarrassed to tell you how many drafts I have completed over that stretch. With so many under my belt, I sometimes like to play around with unusual strategies in an effort to find a better way to build a team. This is an especially good option for those who draft many teams, or for those who can try out these strategies without putting much (or any) money into the endeavor.
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Here are six draft strategies that a restless or new drafter can try this season. They all have one thing in common — they narrow the player pool, which reduces confusion and allows the drafter to focus on a specific group of players.
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The ”Prime Years” strategy
We know that prospect development is rarely linear. We also know that time eventually catches up with all veteran players. Yet, we still automatically project improvement on our young players, and we sometimes express shock when a 35-year-old’s production suddenly falls off a cliff. To avoid having too much wish-casting on our teams, managers can limit themselves to players who are in their prime years. Defining those years is up for debate, but selecting players between ages 26-31 would give managers a large pool to choose from.
Those who use this strategy may want to widen their gap for closers or omit it entirely. After all, there are only a limited number of ninth-inning men to choose from, and the small workload required by their role allows them to often find success at an advanced age.
The ”Ascending” strategy
This is the opposite of the “Prime Years” team and is definitely more fun. Of course, it also has a higher likelihood of disaster. With this plan, the manager only selects players who are at an age where their arrow should still be pointing up. The specific age is up for debate, but managers could have a large group of young, exciting players by limiting themselves to those who are 26 or younger on Opening Day. The hope is that the manager can correctly predict the players who are on their way up and then ride those players to the top of the standings.
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Because of the slow development of pitchers, managers may need to loosen the criteria at that position to those who are under 30 years old.
The ”Bounce-back” strategy
This is one of my favorite strategies for those with enough guts to try it. The plan is simple — find last season’s biggest busts, and draft as many of them as you can. Recency bias is a real thing in fantasy sports, and we struggle to look past last year for those who otherwise have strong track records.
To properly execute this plan, managers will want to dismiss busts who still have injury concerns during Spring Training. Under this plan, players such as Kyle Tucker, Yordan Alvarez and Mookie Betts would be appealing early-round picks, with those such as Jackson Merrill and Dylan Cease being great picks in the subsequent rounds.
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The “OPS Floor” strategy
Although some skill sets are more cherished by fantasy managers than real-life organizations, there will always be a connection between those who thrive in our fake game and those who help their clubs rise up the MLB standings. Fantasy managers who are looking to avoid busts can consider setting an OPS floor for every player they draft. The OPS floor needs to slide throughout the draft, as the options become weaker. For example, players selected in the initial five rounds must have an .800 OPS, both in their career and last season. Those selected in the next five rounds must have an .800 OPS in either 2025 or across their career, and a .750 OPS in the other area. And those selected in Rounds 11-20 must have a .750 OPS in both their career and 2025.
Keeping these standards will ensure that managers only select those who are valuable in fantasy and in the majors. The players who are commonly left out in this plan include powerless speedsters, youngsters with small track records, and prospects. The eliminations would start early this year, as Elly De La Cruz and Julio Rodríguez are popular first-rounders who would miss the cut.
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The ”All Expected Stats” strategy
Although the expected stats generated by Statcast are not meant to be predictive, they still give context to the numbers generated in the past, which helps us to assess players. In general, those who have expected stats that are much better than their actual marks have not been appropriately rewarded for their efforts. Managers could choose to ignore 2025 stats and instead pick their team via expected data, such as xHR, xSLG, xBA and xERA.
With this plan, the likes of George Springer, Corey Seager, Ben Rice, Cole Ragans and Brandon Woodruff would be drafted ahead of their current ADP.
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The “All Position Scarcity” strategy
Last season, I neglected the third base position during one of my drafts. I didn’t like the options when it was my turn to pick, and I wound up settling for a late-round player while promising to address the position via the waiver wire. The plan didn’t work, as third base depth was virtually non-existent last year. I wound up with unproductive players at the position for most of the season, which put me at a disadvantage. To avoid this type of situation, a manager can opt to base their early-round picks around position scarcity, leaving the deepest positions for the second half of their draft. This manager would want to draft their catcher, second baseman and third baseman in the early rounds, while also mixing in some pitchers. They would then tackle first base, and later in the draft, they would load up on outfielders and pluck from a deep pool of shortstops.
With weaknesses at the deepest positions, they would hopefully have success upgrading via the waiver wire, especially in the outfield, given that major league teams have triple the starting outfielders in comparison to each infield spot.