Should You Try an Auction Draft?

The auction draft. You know fantasy veterans swear by it, and that the first fantasy league ever used an auction draft to start their inaugural season. But is it right for you? I’m here to tell you it is!

Snake drafts, where each owner picks a player one after the other, are the default draft for most online leagues. At one time it was too complicated to hold an auction draft online, given the restrictions of 100 MB processors and telephone modems. However, times have changed, but the snake draft remains popular. This is unfortunate as an auction draft is far more rewarding and fun to take part in.

For those who have never tried it, auction drafts allot each owner a set amount of money with which they can bid on available players. You can bid whatever you want for a player, but all of them will have a generally agreed upon value. As such there’s no reason to worry about not knowing how much to bid for players. Websites like ESPN and Yahoo! list a players worth according to their fantasy analysts and their average auction price in drafts that have already happened.

Planning for an auction draft is really almost no different than planning for a snake draft. Except instead of knowing what draft position a player is in, you learn how much each player is worth in fantasy dollars. But the opportunities for strategy in auction drafts are far greater. Auction drafts give each player an opportunity to get any player, meaning you can preplan your roster and utilize personally designed tactics for building your fantasy team.

For example if you decide you want a top tier RB, looking at an auction draft cheatsheet lets you know that’ll cost you around $60 of your $200. And then maybe you want a second tier QB for $25. And two top five WRs for $30 each. If you buy all that you can see you’ll have spent $145, leaving $65 for the rest of your team. In this way you can build your team in advance and make sure you can afford it. And since it’s an auction draft, you really can get those players come draft day.

If any of this sounds complicated, it isn’t. Just go to ESPN and join one of their mock auction drafts. Try it out once or twice and things will immediately become clear. Since it’s a mock draft you can do anything you want and it won’t actually matter. The first time you try it you might overspend, buying four top players only to realize that doesn’t leave you with enough money to fill out a roster. Or then you might underspend and end up with more money left to buy a bench than you need. You’ll quickly get the hang of it and see it’s potential.

And once you have the experience of actually planning a team out and picking the players you want in advance, instead of just having them handed to you by fate and draft position in a snake draft, you’ll be hooked.

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