As much as I’m thankful to Micah James (@FFMagicMan) for everything he has done for the 2-QB fantasy football community this off-season—by hosting a barrage of 2-QB mock drafts—I thought it would be interesting to see what the final results of a live 2-QB mock draft would be.
In theory, that was a great idea, but in reality, it was tricky getting together 12 people for a live 2-QB mock draft; luckily though I was able to round up such a group. There were a few hiccups along the way, with players being mistakenly drafted, and me not really knowing how to fix things in the early part, but eventually we got into a groove and were able to bang out a 14 round, 12-team 2-QB mock draft.
Each team was required to start the following:
2-QBs, 2-RBs, 3-WRs, 1-TE, 1-Flex (RB/WR/TE), 1-D/ST, and 1-Kicker. There were also three bench spots for each team.
A couple of the key scoring rules included: .5 PPR, and 6-Point passing touchdowns.
Not every team drafted an eligible squad, but that was probably because I didn’t explain things fully. The starting roster requirements might seem normal to you, for a 2-QB league, but you might be wondering why only three bench spots?
One interesting aspect of having just three bench spots is seeing how owners would deal with a shallow bench situation in a 2-QB league. Do they draft a handcuff player, do they dedicate either of their two bench spots to the quarterback position? A shallow bench makes you alter your draft strategy slightly, and in a 2-QB league, that adds an extra wrinkle.
Below is a screen grab of the Sports Jerks Network 2-QB Mockdraftapalooza Draft results:
Let’s start off with some quarterback drafting numbers. The total number of quarterbacks drafted was 34, which accounted for just slightly over 20% of the draft picks. Each team drafted a QB3, minus @FFMagicMan and @LordReebs. Even with a shallow bench, a majority of the league decided a QB3 was important enough to use one of their three bench spots on the position.
The first overall pick belonged to Ladd Davies, of lateroundqb.com, and even though this was a passing touchdown heavy 2-QB league, that didn’t him sway him, as Ladd didn’t go with a quarterback first overall, and, instead, he went with Adrian Peterson.
Drafting first overall in a 12-team 2-QB league is a difficult decision. You either take your QB1 and wait to see what’s left at other positions, or you take a non-QB, and wait to see what’s left at the quarterback position when it’s your turn to pick at the 2nd/3rd round turn. By the time your turn to pick in the second round rolls around, you find out whether you’re in a QB-heavy league, or if other owners chose the waiting on quarterback strategy, as well.
With the way the rest of the first round unfolded, it turned out nicely for Ladd, as he was able to take Andrew Luck as his QB1 in the second round, and then grab A.J. Green in the third. A 1-2-3 nucleus of Peterson, Luck and Green isn’t all that bad.
The next four picks after Ladd’s Peterson pick were all quarterbacks, with Drew Brees, Aaron Rodgers, Cam Newton and Tom Brady going back-to-back-to-back-to-back, and another three fantasy signal callers (Colin Kaepernick, Peyton Manning and Russell Wilson) also went in the first round. That’s a total of seven quarterbacks drafted in the first round.
By the time the second round ended, three owners, myself included had drafted their QB1 and QB2, and a total of 11 quarterbacks were drafted by the end of the second round. The three teams that drafted their starting quarterbacking duos ended up with Russell Wilson/Matt Ryan, Peyton Manning/Robert Griffin III, and Cam Newton/Tony Romo. The QB-QB strategy was first initiated by @FFNatureBoy, who went Wilson at 1.12 and Ryan and 2.01.
Drafting last in a 2-QB league gives you an inkling of how the draft might unfold, as you get to see how many quarterbacks went before you, and how many teams still need a QB after you pick. You can either go QB-QB, take one quarterback and one non-quarterback, or forgo the quarterback position entirely. Reading the room and seeing how the draft is moving by the time you pick at the end of the first round should help you figure out your strategy.
The latest a team drafted their QB1 was @DBFNoah, but he also missed most of the draft, and his team was auto drafted, until he made his way to the live draft room. If we take him out of the equation, that leaves us with Chad Scott, of lateroundqb.com and dynastyleaguefootball.com, who took his QB1, Ryan Tannehill with the 6.02 pick.
With that particular strategy, Chad stocked up on running backs and wide receivers, and with 16 quarterbacks drafted before his Tannehill pick, Chad then decided to go QB-QB. After Chad drafted Tannehill as his QB1, he followed that up by snagging Geno Smith in the 7th, and Jake Locker in the 8th. If we take out @DBFNoah’s auto drafted team, Chad, also ended up being the last team to take a QB2.
After looking at the draft results, I then used ProFootballFocus’ customizable projected points tool to see how each team fared, and the results are below*:
1. @Ladd_Davies: 2,321 points
2. @FFRittle: 2,295 points
3. @RussellClay17: 2,270 points
4. @LordReebs: 2,200 points
5. @2QBFFB: 2,186 points
6. @FFMagicMan: 2,180 points
7. @FFNatureBoy: 2,138 points
8. @Chad_Scott13: 2,113 points
9. @JB4tes: 2,066 points
10. @DBFNoah: 2,024 points (No Kicker and no D/ST drafted)
11. @ThatMurph: 2,001 points (No Kicker drafted)
12. @curacaobleu: 1,995 points
There were a variety of different strategies in this mock draft, with teams going QB-QB, some teams taking a quarterback in the first and waiting to draft their QB2 until later in the draft, and one team filling out their quarterback depth in the middle rounds of the draft. As you can see from the above projected points standings, Ladd ended up with the highest projected scoring team, and while he didn’t take a quarterback in the first round, he did take one in the second round.
I wanted to compare the teams Chad and @FFNatureBoy drafted, because they were both next to each other in draft slots, and they both went with wildly different 2-QB drafting strategies. Chad, drafting 11th overall, went QB-QB-QB, in the 6th, 7th, and 8th rounds, while @FFNatureBoy, drafting 12th, went QB-QB, in rounds 1 and 2.
When breaking down the PFF projected points for those two teams we got this:
- Chad received 540 points from his QB1+QB2 tandem, while @FFNatureBoy’s starting quarterback duo netted him 731 points, for a difference of 191 points, in favor of @FFNatureBoy.
- The rest of Chad’s starting line-up was good for 1,448 points, and @FFNatureBoy’s was worth 1,407 points; a difference of 41 points, favouring Chad.
- In the final standings, @FFNatureBoy outscored Chad by 25 points.
There was a huge discrepancy in points from the quarterback position for the two teams, but even though @FFNatureBoy, had the highest projected scoring quarterback tandem, out of all 12 teams, his team still wound up in 7th place; 183 points out of first, and 132 points out of third.
When you take a look at the different strategies and the final projected points results, can we say there’s a must follow 2-QB fantasy football league drafting strategy? When the league is made up of 12 teams, instead of 10, and each passing touchdown is worth 6 points, instead of 4, I think there is one common thread, which is you want to draft your QB1 early
One thing in common the top five highest scoring projected teams had was that they all took a quarterback early, and four of the five teams drafted their QB1 in the first round. Looking at just the top three projected scoring teams, each of them went with a quarterback within the first two rounds, but they also each waited until the middle rounds to draft their QB2, with Ladd waiting the longest, and taking Rivers at 7.01.
In this particular draft, it worked for those three teams, as they each filled their teams up with running backs and wide receivers until going after their QB2. And evidenced by Chad’s complete late round 2-QB draft strategy, it doesn’t pay to wait too long to draft your quarterbacks, especially your QB1, in 2-QB fantasy football leagues.
*Projected points based off of customized PFF projected points from May 26, 2013, and the points were derived by using the highest scoring players at each position, not by draft rank.
