We’ve made it through the dynasty season and most leagues have transitioned to the 2025 season. This is really what makes dynasty so different than redrafts or keeper leagues. I took a small break to ring in the new year and now back to reviewing my teams in preparation for the offseason and ultimately to the draft.
My process is very deliberate no matter what the outcome of my teams. During the months of Jan, Feb, & Mar I take a deep dive into each one of my teams recording what went well and where I think I missed opportunities. I look at things over all such as the 1 first round pick I traded on a team that didn’t win money. It happened to be a semi final team in a league that doesn’t pay for 3rd place. Still, I won 3 championships out of 55 dynasty teams which isn’t the level that makes me comfortable overall and I really want to make sure that I’m increasing that number next year.
At this point I also begin to research on the players that performed worse than the draft spots and look for buying opportunities. Players like Stroud were drafted higher and didn’t return value this year and will be a player whose acquisition cost should be low while players like Baker Mayfield has seen his value grow this year and might be a player to sell high on. Players I consider buys aren’t necessarily targets and players I consider sells aren’t going for under value prices, they are just players I’m willing to buy or sell depending on where over reactions will occur. I want to always capitalize on recency bias and buy the dip while selling the peak.
My rookie draft list will be slightly unique to me and my leagues, but also I believe in simply drafting the best players and not worrying about the mix. Last year MHJ was my 1.01 and I took him everywhere in every format no matter what. Caleb was my 1.02 and Daniels 1.03. Where I went away from the norm was at 1.04, this was Drake Maye for me. I then went McCarthy which was different than most. In multiple QB leagues I found that having an abundance of QB’s never made me feel bad.
I also prefer to keep as many players protected throughout the summer as possible as many of the players on teams today will be far different by the end of free agency at the rookie draft and by the end of training camp teams will look totally different with depth charts flipped upside down. I remember following the 2019 season I made Marlon Mack fresh off his 1000 yard rushing campaign my rb1 when in the draft in 2020 they drafted Taylor. James Robinson and his great overtaking of Fournette, which seems so long ago, and yet it was only 5 years ago.
Change is coming so don’t react just watch and be patient allowing your league mates to make mistakes. Good Luck in the offseason.
