Hello and welcome. A couple weeks ago, I promised to work on Average Draft Position (ADP) for deep dynasty leagues. It’s a segment of the fantasy baseball community that is underserved by industry resources. Yes, there are a few dynasty specific sites that provide helpful coverage, but nearly all of the analysis is based on a given writer’s personal rankings and preferences.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with that. However, you would always check redraft rankings against ADP, right? Why not do the same in a dynasty league? Today, we take our first step in the right direction.

This project is made possible by the rise of FanTrax as the preferred home for dynasty fantasy baseball. They have easily exported CSVs of the player pool and draft results, which allows me to perform simple Excel functions within my limited* capabilities**.

*I’m embarrassed to admit it took me five minutes to remember that the Column Index in a VLookup is just a number and not a range.

**Does anybody know how to prevent players with the same name (i.e. Wander Franco (2 of them), Luis Garcia (4), etc.) from all capturing the same values? – UPDATE: Next version will use concatenate to address this problem.

Here is a link to the ADP. If anybody has recommendations for beautifying the results, I’m all ears. There are three columns. The first is player name. The next two are ADP and Ordinal Rank. Simple, right.

Presently, this should be considered a tool of modest value. There are known issues like the aforementioned four Garcias. If you use it carefully, you’ll get something out of it. If you depend on it to supply you with ABSOLUTE TRUTH, well… you’ll be disappointed.

As I said, this is very much a first step in the right direction. There are only four leagues in the sample, all of which include some notable quirks. That’s always going to be the case with dynasty leagues. I’ve listed those quirks in a separate tab. The early picks are slightly skewed by a league that began their draft during the 2018 season. Ronald Acuna was picked 31. He was a top two choice in the other three leagues.

Three Ways To Use This

The best way to use this is just like redraft ADP – as a rough smell test. Is it too early to start thinking about Wander Franco? No, probably not. What about Luke Voit? Where does he belong in a deep dynasty format? Apparently somewhere around pick 200.

This also makes for a useful prospect discovery tool. At least two of the three seed leagues featured highly skilled prospect hounds. Use this to find the next great prospect studs who aren’t yet on everybody’s radar. Guys like Xavier Edwards and Marco Luciano.

ADP is not just for fresh start-up leagues either. When making your keeper decisions, you can use this to compare valuations. Trying to decide between Anibal Sanchez and Matt Boyd for your last spot? You might be surprised to discover that Sanchez has been available over 200 picks later than Boyd. Perhaps you can re-select him in your draft instead.

Next Steps

Send me more of your start up dynasty leagues on FanTrax. Please note any basic quirks like those listed in the provided link. Remember, we’re looking for leagues that pick 600 or more players. AL and NL Only formats of comparable depth may also participate.

An Excel Book version of this with all league inputs will be available to my patrons within the next week.