Using Our Draft Kit to Win Your ESPN Fantasy Football League
We're all in the thick of fantasy football draft season, and while we may not have had as much training camp and preseason exposure as usual, the algorithms at numberFire haven't been sleeping.
And that's good news for us because our draft kit is fully customizable for your league settings, and we can use those to find leverage spots in fantasy football drafts.
Because your draft lobby will sort and rank players differently based on your site of choice, your favorite sleepers may be gone by the time you normally would draft them in your mocks. If your site ranks your 10th-round gem as a 7th-round pick, you have to adjust.
So, know your league settings and plan accordingly. I'm trying to help.
I ran numberFire's projections -- tailored to the default ESPN scoring setup -- to find the biggest discrepancies between our ranks and ESPN's default list.
Things to Know
1. ESPN's default scoring is PPR. Full-PPR scoring doesn't usually change how to value players within a position but does affect positional value compared to one another.
2. ESPN's default lineup is QB/RB/RB/WR/WR/TE/Flex. This means two receivers instead of three weekly -- unless you flex one.
3. Interceptions are -2 points. This makes interceptions a bit more costly than on some other sites. It may not seem like much, but a two- or three-pick day can be a fantasy destroyer.
Overvalued ESPN Players According to Our Projections
These are the biggest rank differentials inside ESPN's top 180, in terms of being overvalued based on our projections.
Player | Position | numberFire Rank |
ESPN Rank |
Differential |
---|---|---|---|---|
Parris Campbell | WR | 274 | 126 | -148 |
Curtis Samuel | WR | 228 | 102 | -126 |
Tee Higgins | WR | 275 | 154 | -121 |
Damien Harris | RB | 242 | 132 | -110 |
Justin Jackson | RB | 250 | 140 | -110 |
Randall Cobb | WR | 259 | 149 | -110 |
Larry Fitzgerald | WR | 257 | 148 | -109 |
Mohamed Sanu | WR | 261 | 152 | -109 |
Denzel Mims | WR | 262 | 153 | -109 |
Robby Anderson | WR | 204 | 97 | -107 |
Irv Smith Jr. | TE | 269 | 163 | -106 |
Darrel Williams | RB | 264 | 160 | -104 |
Rob Gronkowski | TE | 212 | 113 | -99 |
A.J. Dillon | RB | 252 | 156 | -96 |
Eric Ebron | TE | 258 | 162 | -96 |
Benny Snell Jr. | RB | 251 | 158 | -93 |
Chase Edmonds | RB | 229 | 139 | -90 |
Jack Doyle | TE | 246 | 161 | -85 |
Brandon Aiyuk | WR | 225 | 144 | -81 |
Allen Lazard | WR | 230 | 150 | -80 |
Sammy Watkins | WR | 221 | 145 | -76 |
Darius Slayton | WR | 155 | 98 | -57 |
Noah Fant | TE | 160 | 112 | -48 |
Henry Ruggs | WR | 142 | 100 | -42 |
John Brown | WR | 137 | 99 | -38 |
Tyler Higbee | TE | 119 | 83 | -36 |
Darrell Henderson | RB | 118 | 84 | -34 |
Chris Herndon | TE | 169 | 135 | -34 |
Michael Pittman Jr. | WR | 175 | 147 | -28 |
Deebo Samuel | WR | 94 | 68 | -26 |
Zach Ertz | TE | 65 | 42 | -23 |
Justin Jefferson | WR | 132 | 109 | -23 |
A.J. Brown | WR | 54 | 33 | -21 |
Will Fuller | WR | 87 | 66 | -21 |
T.J. Hockenson | TE | 136 | 115 | -21 |
Jalen Reagor | WR | 172 | 151 | -21 |
Because ESPN values quarterbacks and tight ends similarly to how we do, these are mostly running back and receiver picks. That just means individual evaluation discrepancies in value rather than a positional discrepancy.
The biggest gaps inside ESPN's top 100 include a lot of downfield receivers: Robby Anderson, Darius Slayton, Henry Ruggs, John Brown, and Will Fuller.
Tyler Higbee and Zach Ertz rate out as overvalued tight ends on ESPN, as well.
Undervalued ESPN Players According to Our Projections
Here's the opposite: players inside numberFire's top 180 with the biggest differentials in ESPN draft app ranking.
Player | Position | numberFire Rank |
ESPN Rank |
Differential |
---|---|---|---|---|
Antonio Gibson | RB | 63 | 129 | 66 |
Ke'Shawn Vaughn | RB | 96 | 159 | 63 |
Cam Newton | QB | 105 | 164 | 59 |
Marlon Mack | RB | 84 | 131 | 47 |
Jared Goff | QB | 127 | 166 | 39 |
Ryan Tannehill | QB | 130 | 165 | 35 |
Ryquell Armstead | RB | 59 | 91 | 32 |
Chris Thompson | RB | 103 | 133 | 30 |
James White | RB | 57 | 86 | 29 |
Todd Gurley | RB | 18 | 43 | 25 |
Josh Allen | QB | 95 | 119 | 24 |
Duke Johnson | RB | 104 | 128 | 24 |
James Conner | RB | 23 | 45 | 22 |
Kareem Hunt | RB | 35 | 57 | 22 |
Hunter Henry | TE | 89 | 110 | 21 |
Anthony Miller | WR | 106 | 127 | 21 |
Michael Gesicki | TE | 114 | 134 | 20 |
Melvin Gordon | RB | 25 | 44 | 19 |
Drew Brees | QB | 101 | 120 | 19 |
Matt Breida | RB | 70 | 88 | 18 |
Tom Brady | QB | 99 | 117 | 18 |
CeeDee Lamb | WR | 107 | 125 | 18 |
Jonathan Taylor | RB | 30 | 47 | 17 |
David Montgomery | RB | 41 | 58 | 17 |
Boston Scott | RB | 124 | 141 | 17 |
Mark Ingram | RB | 55 | 71 | 16 |
Matt Ryan | QB | 100 | 116 | 16 |
Ben Roethlisberger | QB | 122 | 138 | 16 |
Baker Mayfield | QB | 151 | 167 | 1 |
Chris Carson | RB | 24 | 39 | 15 |
David Johnson | RB | 26 | 40 | 14 |
Raheem Mostert | RB | 46 | 60 | 14 |
Dak Prescott | QB | 62 | 75 | 13 |
We're a little more bullish on some running backs than ESPN is. That includes not-quite-yet-starters Antonio Gibson, Ke'Shawn Vaughn, and Marlon Mack. The Leonard Fournette release leaves some value in the Jacksonville Jaguars' backfield in the form of Ryquell Armstead and Chris Thompson, as well.
Josh Allen, Drew Brees, and Tom Brady are rare quarterbacks that numberFire's algorithm views both as a fantasy starters and heavily undervalued on a drafting app. ESPN pits a run of seven quarterbacks in the 110 range, and we can take advantage of that.
A Closer Look at the Top
Unlike with Yahoo where we saw a ton of differences inside the top-36 picks in the draft app, the list on ESPN is much smaller.
Player | Position | numberFire Rank | ESPN Rank | Differential |
---|---|---|---|---|
A.J. Brown | WR | 54 | 33 | -21 |
Courtland Sutton | WR | 45 | 30 | -15 |
Adam Thielen | WR | 37 | 27 | -10 |
Amari Cooper | WR | 38 | 29 | -9 |
D.J. Moore | WR | 33 | 25 | -8 |
Calvin Ridley | WR | 40 | 32 | -8 |
Patrick Mahomes | QB | 42 | 35 | -7 |
Robert Woods | WR | 43 | 36 | -7 |
Part of this is because receivers are valued more appropriately in the full-PPR setup on ESPN. Our algorithms don't love receivers early in a half-PPR setup because we can initially project running backs for a healthy season. But with ESPN's PPR setting, it's a much sharper draft app compared to the way our algorithms expect the season to play out.