Last year, I wrote a long post looking at strategies and resources to consider for Omnifantasy drafts, and that post is worth your time if you’re interested in looking at this thing from a strategic perspective. Of course, one of the joys of Omnifantasy is you don’t necessarily need to do that — there are probably some edges to be had with some form of value-based drafting or structural considerations, but the various sports also go through ebbs and flows in terms of how their results are determined over time, and we’re inherently looking at small samples as it relates to periods of time in various sports.
What I mean by that is in that post I referenced results dating to 2015, and in that time we’ve seen shifts in certain leagues. In the NFL, the New England Patriots were a perennial top-drafted option that paid off with Super Bowl appearances for three straight seasons, from 2016-2018. The Chiefs almost immediately took up that mantle as the new AFC powerhouse who repeated as conference champions in both 2019 and 2020. But while the Chiefs still look very good, the sport appears headed toward a period of a little more parity than that stretch, and we saw that in the 2021 results.
Similarly, in the NBA, whatever team LeBron James was on has been something of a lock for an NBA Finals appearance at times, but last year we got a Finals matchup of the Suns and Bucks, two teams who had not been conference champions since at least the early 1990s.
So there’s this element in the past results we have to consider which is how that individual sport is progressing over time.
One of the other elements is simpler, and easier to decipher — how the sport is scored in Omnifantasy. For most sports, there is a playoff bracket format, but how each round is decided can dictate how volatile the results are. The NBA, for example, uses seven-game series and is a sport where traditionally the cream can rise to the top over that stretch of contests. Upsets are fewer and farther between than, say, the NCAA basketball tournament, with its one-and-done format and the largest bracket of any contest in Omnifantasy, given it includes 68 teams. That sport is traditionally upset-friendly, where finishing in the final eight teams — a requirement of any Omnifantasy pick to secure Omnifantasy points in that sport — requires three straight wins in elimination games. In other sports, the regular season can lock you into the final eight (or in the case of college football, the regular season can lock you into the final four teams in the College Football Playoff, although in some ways all the regular season games feel like one-and-done contests, with a few notable exceptions).
So there are really two layers to consider with any Omnifantasy pick.
Do I like the situation for that given team/player and want to bet on them?
Do I think this is a sport worth investing in at this point in the draft?
When I’m drafting personally, sometimes 1. is enough. Sometimes I just want to root for a given team, or think this is their year to break through. But it’s always worth considering 2., which relates to the overall value you can build into your Omnifantasy roster. If you’re at a point with a tossup between two different sports, a good question to ask yourself is, “What are my alternatives in later rounds in this sport versus my alternatives in the other sports I may be considering?”
I was talking recently with Ship Chaser and RotoViz guy Conor O’Driscoll, who won the FFPC Best Ball Tournament in 2021, and I loved the way he referred to Omnifantasy when he said “it feels like a very pure form of fantasy, in that you’re boiling it down to having to think about probabilities and bets and ranges.”
As Omnifantasy evolves and more people try it out, one of the key things I’m seeing is a reliance on the “Expected Points” on the site. For reference, those are created based on 250 simulations and an average of the results of each. While they are a great guideline about the relative top-heaviness of various sports, they are also in some ways a lie. For some sports, there are several options with high Expected Points totals, while in others no option sits particularly high in Expected Points. But the reality of Omnifantasy is every sport is scored the same — there will be one winner who nets 80 points, one runner-up who nets 50, and so on.
I like to think of Expected Points as a floor of sorts. For the sports where a bunch of options rate highly, what the Expected Points are telling us is in the 250 simulations, there aren’t a lot of scenarios where those picks finish with 0 points. Take the WNBA, where the Expected Points of the top five or six teams are relatively flat, but high for each team. There are only 12 total WNBA teams, so the Expected Points are telling us there are not a lot of scenarios where one of the favorites doesn’t finish in the top eight. That’d require them to be in the bottom third of the league.
Meanwhile, in sports where no one rates highly, we’re seeing that every pick has some risk to finish outside the top eight. Take golf, where any given golfer can have a tough year at the majors and fail to score Omnifantasy points. And yet, when viewing these two sports together, I’m struck by the reality that some golfer will win 80 Omnifantasy points, which more or less locks the eventual golf winner into being one of the biggest overperformers relative to Expected Points. That is to say, with no golfer who has at least 20 Expected Points (and only Jon Rahm over 12.1), it’s a certainty there will be a golfer whose actual output outpaces his Expected Points by at least 60 points. Meanwhile, in the WNBA, where five different teams have at least 30 Expected Points, it’s a certainty at least one will fail to live up to that billing, finishing instead in the 20 tier or perhaps lower.
I note this because what I’ve seen in some drafts is the fourth or fifth WNBA pick going before the top option in another sport that has fewer Expected Points. In fact, I have one draft where seven WNBA picks have gone and no golfer has. I’m not saying I think that’s clearly wrong, but I do think there’s a strategic argument for taking a top option in a sport at a lower Expected Points total because ultimately the Expected Points don’t count for anything, and over my years doing this, I’ve definitely seen top options win even the unpredictable sports.
My feeling is you should be targeting the 80s and the 50s wherever you can, because that’s what drives the big overall Omnifantasy scores that will win you your league. In the case of the league where seven WNBA picks have gone, that’s more than half that league, meaning we’re into the average teams and they are likely being targeted largely on the basis of feeling like a good bet for at least 20 points. But I’m not sure I want to make that type of pick in the first four or five rounds, where just grabbing 20 points is the table stakes if you want to win your league, and what you really want is a roster that has multiple shots at 80 at the top. It’s probably the case that the run-of-the-mill WNBA teams, by odds, do have a solid shot to win the 80. But again, this was just a conceptual discussion I thought was worth having as I’ve started to see drafts that are more concentrated in the first few rounds than ever before.
If you think about it like fantasy football, you can make a case some sports are like kickers or DSTs. The point I’m trying to drive home is that analogy does not hold, because while kickers or DSTs are both unpredictable and also their scoring often winds up bunched up in a way that no one in the sport really separates — this is especially true with kickers — the way Omnifantasy is scored ensures that every single sport will have the same differential between the top scorer for that sport and the teams that score no points. The winner will get 80, the runner-up will get 50, and there will be eight total picks that score points. In that way, one pretty valid way to draft in Omnifantasy, in my mind, is just to always zig when others zag — to never chase runs and always pick from the sport that no one has touched over the past few rounds. Sometimes there are legitimate reasons no one is drafting from a given sport in a given range, and there are definitely sports I will just outright punt on if I don’t get a target in a specific range. But broadly, with the number of overall sports in play, there is usually one or two that is being forgotten about by the draft in a way that makes it a good target.
There’s a ton of fun in Omnifantasy in just having a team to root for in a bunch of different sports, as well, and the main thing I want to drive home is you don’t have to let your draft dictate your picks too much. It’s no fun when you think a pick you don’t necessarily want to make is the “right” pick, and all I’m trying to drive home is I’m not even sure when you may feel that way because of things like the Expected Points, that the pick you’re looking at actually is, you know, right.
But I also mentioned the sports you can punt on, and you can certainly spend a lot of time considering the ways a sport might play out, and what that means for how to approach it in a draft. I did that in last year’s strategy guide, which I want to quickly update here. I might throw in a quote from last year’s notes that I think is particularly useful, if 2021 confirmed that notion. I might add some additional context I find interesting.
As a reminder, the way to read the shorthand is the number after a sport refers to draft position within that sport, which is to say something like “MLB5” would mean the fifth-drafted MLB team, or roughly the fifth-best futures odds when the draft took place in January/February. Early years use draft results from my one league that goes back that far, while 2021 results will refer to an ADP (average draft position) we put together last year of 10 leagues with consistent settings.
MLB
Listed results work back from 2021 to 2015
Past winners: MLB5, MLB2, MLB11, MLB7, MLB7, MLB1, MLB13
Past runners-up: MLB12, MLB8, MLB4, MLB2, MLB5, MLB19, undrafted
Key notes from last year:
“…four of the past six World Series winners were drafted as the seventh MLB team or later in Omnifantasy, and two more runners-up fit that mold with one being undrafted entirely.” The 2021 update to this note was there was one more runner-up plus a winner who wasn’t seventh or later in the sport but also not one of the top four teams (the Braves were fifth-drafted last year).
“…as a general rule, I tend to wait on MLB until the middle rounds and then maybe target two good-but-not-great teams that have reasonable odds to win their divisions and reach the postseason.” Both the Braves and Astros came from divisions without a lot of strong teams, and were able to win their divisions and immediately advance to the quarterfinals, where they then had strong postseasons.
MLB feels fairly clear, in that there can be some uncertainty and that makes waiting and potentially using a Flex pick on the sport both viable options. At the same time, I would definitely consider a team like the Dodgers reasonably early in drafts, because of their huge payroll and talent-laden roster. We’ve seen the first- or second-drafted MLB teams reach the World Series three times in the Omnifantasy era, and 2022 sets up like a year where the sport has a pretty clear favorite.
NBA
Past winners: NBA4, NBA1, NBA3, NBA1, NBA1, NBA3, NBA4
Past runners-up: NBA10, NBA6, NBA1, NBA2, NBA2, NBA1, NBA1
Key notes from last year:
“…the reality is NBA odds don’t shift much based on regular season results.” As we look at 2022, the Brooklyn Nets sit among the favorites despite a poor W-L record right now.
“For me, the NBA has been an “early or punt” sport and I tend not to take a flex here.”
2021 was the least predictable NBA season in some time, and some of that is due to LeBron James perhaps not being quite as dominant as his peak, or just playing with a worse roster than he has at other times, I’m not sure. Things have opened up a bit, but the series format does typically help better teams advance, and .
NFL
Past winners: NFL5, NFL20, NFL3, NFL1, undrafted, NFL1, NFL4
Past runners-up: undrafted, NFL1, NFL16, NFL9, NFL1, NFL18, NFL11
Key notes from last year:
“I like to look at available cap space at Over The Cap, and a big thing I target is teams with quarterbacks on rookie contracts because of the flexibility that allows, or teams that look like they might be a quarterback away from their odds increasing substantially.” Come on down, Bengals and Rams.
“…there’s a pretty good case to wait on an NFL pick and to avoid last year’s one-year wonders who enter the offseason with strong futures odds.”
It’s a really interesting year for the rookie contract teams, because the 2021 QB class struggled. Trevor Lawrence and Jags, Justin Fields and the Bears, and Zach Wilson and the Jets would all presumably fit the mold with really long odds, but those teams might not have the right formulas, and it’s not like every team is destined to succeed, or every young QB is destined to be really good. We saw more from Joe Burrow in his rookie season than any of those quarterbacks in theirs, for starters. I do still really like the Chargers again this year, who I took last year and still have Justin Herbert on his rookie deal and more pieces around him than some of those longer-odds options, plus the Chargers are third in available cap space.
As for teams that might be a quarterback away, the Broncos have a lot of pieces and a healthy chunk of cap space, but it has to be said that’s a tough division. The Panthers are a huge long shot, but they have a young defense and some offensive talent. They don’t have a ton of cap space, but the Buccaneers and Saints fading a bit could make the division more winnable. The Steelers are another clear option where they lose Ben Roethlisberger but he also wasn’t very good late in his career, and an argument could be made they could upgrade that position with a mid-level acquisition.
Broadly, the NFL feels pretty open, and while it’s the sport I’m most comfortable and that comfort level might breed overconfidence, there are picks I like at all phases of Omnifantasy drafts.
NCAAB
Past winners: NCAAB2, N/A, NCAAB4, NCAAB1, NCAAB8, NCAAB7, NCAAB3
Past runners-up: NCAAB1, N/A, NCAAB20, NCAAB20, NCAAB3, NCAAB2, NCAAB4
Key notes from last year:
“This might be the first one where pulling the past results… is making me reconsider something. Traditionally, I’ve tended to punt NCAAB because the playoff structure is so deep and you have to make the Elite Eight to earn Omnifantasy points that it feels like an unnecessary risk… it’s interesting that in the five years of results that we have, every winner was a top-eight pick. There’s certainly an advantage to being a No. 1 or No. 2 seed in the tournament, and the eventual winner typically does wind up being a higher seed. There’s risk here, but you’re not lost if you’re chasing a top team.”
Baylor won the title, with Gonzaga as the runner up, and they were the top two college basketball picks in Omni drafts last year. The cream does seem to continue to rise, but at the same time, four teams in the final eight were NCAAB16 or later, with two being undrafted. With the uncertainty of the tournament structure, you can definitely find points later.
NCAAF
Past winners: NCAAF5, NCAAF3, NCAAF11, NCAAF2, NCAAF1, NCAAF2, NCAAF3
Past runners-up: NCAAF1, NCAAF2, NCAAF2, NCAAF1, NCAAF12, NCAAF1, NCAAF10
Key notes from last year:
“The dominance of Alabama and Clemson over the past half dozen years shows here.” Alabama again finished runners-up, while Clemson faltered, which opened the door.
“There are a lot of potential upstarts, so it’s another “early or punt” sport.”
Interestingly, while Cincinnati and Michigan were both late or undrafted options that made the CFP, the team that met Alabama in the final was another top option, Georgia, as the fifth-drafted team. In Omnifantasy drafts last year, the top five was a pretty clear cutoff, where all five had an ADP in the first 60 picks, and then no other college football team had an ADP before pick 100. So Georgia was in a group of three schools behind Alabama and Clemson that were considered “the best of the rest,” along with Ohio State and Oklahoma.
This year, there is a top four, with Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State, and Clemson all projecting for at least 15 Expected Points, and no other team over 7. Based on past results, I could see making a case for Ohio State or Clemson in something like the fourth or fifth round, but after that I’m probably not prioritizing NCAAF picks until the back third of the draft.
NHL
Past winners: NHL1, NHL1, NHL16, NHL6, NHL4, NHL11, NHL1
Past runners-up: NHL8, NHL8, NHL11, NHL2, NHL12, NHL14, NHL13
Key notes from last year:
“As far as I understand it, the NHL is known for teams getting hot in the playoffs and making a run, often behind a goalie playing out of his mind. Five times in the past six years, a team drafted outside the top 10 NHL teams in our January/February in-season draft has managed to reach the Stanley Cup Finals.” That should have said six times in six years, as both Finals participants were outside the top 10 drafted teams on two separate occasions, but it didn’t happen in 2021 and that’s now two straight years with the top overall NHL team winning the Stanley Cup, as the Lightning repeated as champions.
“The NHL is one of my favorite sports to flex because there are probably a limited pool of realistic options but lower seeds that make the playoffs do seem to have a decent chance to make a run.”
It’s probably fine to take an NHL team reasonably early, but the bigger key for me than where you might take one is you do probably want to get one by the middle rounds, since we have good information on who might be in the postseason at this point in their regular season. And by extension, as noted in that second bullet point, a mid-round flex might also be worthwhile, since we can eliminate several teams from having realistic shots to win and the overall pool in this sport is probably capped to roughly 20 viable picks, which increases the odds you’ll hit the correct longshot versus other unpredictable sports like the NFL where the Bengals made the Super Bowl this past year after having odds in Omnifantasy drafting season that placed them around 28th in their sport, and thus they were undrafted in many Omni leagues.
ATP
Past winners: ATP1, ATP1, ATP2, ATP3, ATP6, ATP2, ATP1
Past runners-up: ATP4, ATP5, ATP1, ATP2, ATP7, ATP4, ATP3
Key notes from last year:
“Because tennis and golf are scored differently with aggregated results across the major tournaments, one upset or one bad outing doesn’t doom a pick. That builds in a little resiliency for the top picks where they have multiple chances to find a good result.” Even with Novak Djokovic not participating in the 2022 Australian Open, he won the overall 80 thanks to two wins and a runner-up finish in the three majors last year.
“…that old guard is starting to age out a little bit, so tennis could experience an upheaval over the next few years.” Djokovic was dominant again, and Nadal won the Australian to salvage his season after losing his specialty, the French, but Federer’s days appear numbered and there are a ton of young options who could be the future of the sport.
Tennis is I think an opportunity this year. People don’t want to take Novak Djokovic high because of uncertainty around whether he will play due to his vaccination status, but there’s a possibility he wouldn’t need all four tournaments to win the 80 for Omnifantasy, much like last year. Also, while his odds to win each major remain high, it’s worth pointing out that the other contestant’s odds suggest Djokovic is expected to play. In other words, if you think Djokovic will miss a given tournament for vaccination status reasons, you can place bets right now on the other top contenders at great prices, as a whole.
For the U.S. Open, for example, DraftKings lists Djokovic at +125, while Daniil Medvedev is +275 and no one else is better than +700 (Nadal). That reflects some uncertainty in the field around who might step up, but the odds continue to stretch — there are only four more guys at better than 20/1 — so if we knew Djokovic wasn’t going to be in the field, we’d be getting great prices on the presumed favorite Medvedev as well as anyone else we think might be in serious contention.
But what I’m seeing in early drafts is not only an unwillingness to take Djokovic high, but also an unwillingness to make those bets on other tennis options, who presumably have solid shots to win the 80 if Djokovic is a real risk to miss tournaments. I think there are two options in a sport that is traditionally top-heavy — either you think Djokovic is a good value as he slips out of the top few picks in some drafts, or you think the next best guys like Medvedev or others are underpriced relative to their odds, which make them nice targets.
PGA
Past winners: PGA2, PGA3, PGA5, PGA9, PGA19, PGA3, PGA6
Past runners-up: undrafted, PGA21, PGA3, undrafted, PGA12, PGA6, PGA4
Key notes from last year:
“…there’s a pool of the very best golfers in the world, and the Omnifantasy PGA winner or runner up has come from the top six highest drafted golfers in any given year on seven out of a possible 12 occasions.” Jon Rahm added to this list in 2021.
“There’s also been a longshot to win at least one of the tournaments each year we’ve done this, which typically propels them into the top five in the final Omnifantasy standings.” Phil Mickelson added to this list in 2021.
“Picking that (late-round) guy is pretty tough from a big group of potential options. It’s probably the case that PGA should be treated like the college sports I described above, where you’re less likely to flex and either take one of the very best options or wait it out.”
Golf’s one of my favorite Omnifantasy sports, because there are multiple tournaments and anyone can win one, so a longshot pick won’t be out of it until all the results are in. That said, there is definitely also a strong case to take a guy in an earlier round. Someone from among the very best of the best in the world tends to rise to the top over the course of the five tournaments we score, and because there is a big group at the top, golf tends to get shied away from in drafts, creating opportunity for some nice mid-round value picks with real chances to take down 80 points in an area of drafts where a lot of drafters are focused on picks that might be more likely to earn 20 or 30, as I discussed in the intro.
NASCAR
Past winners: NASCAR8, NASCAR7, NASCAR2, NASCAR4, NASCAR5, NASCAR3, NASCAR12
Past runners-up: NASCAR7, NASCAR8, NASCAR3, NASCAR5, NASCAR3, NASCAR2, NASCAR2
Key notes from last year:
“I don’t claim to know anything about NASCAR, but when you look at the odds you’ll see typically seven or so top drivers and then a pretty big gap by the time you get down to around the 10th driver. And in the past, the top finishers have almost overwhelmingly seemed to come from that top pool.”
“The one time NASCAR was won by a later pick back in 2015, it was Kyle Busch, who I believe had a broken leg that year so he was scheduled to miss half the season. He did well enough in the second half to qualify for NASCAR’s playoffs, and then he took it down.”
“NASCAR is another early or punt option for me, and I think it’s reasonable to flex if done early.”
We got similar results in 2021, where the NASCAR playoffs were somewhat unpredictable and it was the seventh- and eighth-drafted drivers finishing first and second for the second straight year, but it was yet another season where the top finishers did come from that large first tier.
Champions League (UCL)
Past winners: UCL8, UCL4, UCL4, UCL5, UCL3, UCL3, UCL2
Past runners-up: UCL2, UCL5, UCL7, UCL8, UCL5, UCL4, UCL6
Key notes from last year:
“The Champions League schedule is long, and during draft time they are already in the Round of 16. That means the field is already whittled down considerably, so even the seventh- or eighth-highest drafted team reaching the final is in some ways a longshot making a run.” Chelsea won in 2021 as the eighth-drafted team.
“It’s probably reasonable to flex in Champions League if you do it early, because even though the field is down to 16, the longshots don’t stand much of a chance.”
The first legs of the Round of 16 have already started for the Champions League, so keep in mind there are some results already in when you look at the odds and are drafting. The second legs are not until March, so we sit on those half results for who will advance for what is essentially the rest of Omnifantasy drafting season.
MLS
Past winners: MLS6, MLS17, MLS5, N/A, MLS8, N/A, N/A
Past runners-up: MLS9, MLS3, MLS9, N/A, MLS2, N/A, N/A
Key notes from last year:
“MLS is a bit of a crapshoot… There’s not much I can offer here — it’s tough to even find reliable MLS futures odds — but I like to wait and make MLS picks late. I also don’t mind flexing because longshots can fare well.”
In the four years of results we have, seven of the eight finals participants have been rafted in the first 10 MLS options, so there’s at least that. But the top pick has yet to make the finals, and we’ve seen four participants in the MLS6-MLS10 range than the MLS1-MLS5 range.
This is one sport that I think runs against my introduction, where even if your draft is avoiding dipping their toes in, I’m not sure you’re gaining much by taking the top option. In a sport like golf, taking Jon Rahm has some real credibility behind it. I don’t know much about the MLS, but the odds do seem to lack a certain predictiveness, so it’s probably best to treat the Expected Points like they are less certain that the ones for other sports, since those Expected Points are driven by the futures odds.
WNBA
Past winners: WNBA4
Past runners-up: WNBA5
I reviewed the 2021 WNBA results in a recent post, and as it was a new sport last year, that’s all we have for past Omnifantasy data. As I noted in last year’s strategy post, “One thing we know is that with only 12 teams in the league, the likelihood of a pick finishing in the top eight is obviously very high.” I added to that in the introduction here — I’m not sure that means we should see as many WNBA picks go as high as they tend to, because people tend to value that security. It’s an interesting one to do a full-on punt with, because while it feels like the teams with the worst odds may not have much of a chance, they don’t have to be one of the best teams in the league to earn 20 points. Finishing eighth out of 12 gets it done.
One other note from my 2021 review: “Going forward, the WNBA will move to a more standard eight-team playoff bracket and each round will have series, whereas in the past the early rounds of the WNBA playoffs have featured one-game matchups like the Mercury’s win over Seattle (in 2021). That (structure change) will presumably reduce playoff variance.”
World Cup
Past winners: WC4 (2018), WC4 (2014)
Past runners-up: WC11 (2018), WC2 (2014)
We have limited historical results for the World Cup, and an added layer of difficulty where we don’t even have qualification finalized. Wikipedia shows which teams have already qualified and where the various confederation playoffs are in their processes, which is helpful in determining the bet you are making. One key note is Italy and Portugal find themselves in a four-nation playoff where only one team will get the nod, which is to say that one of those nations will miss out altogether, despite them having the eighth- and 10th-best odds of all participants of winning the whole thing. Those results will be decided in March.
Last year, with the EURO, I argued for drafters to look at the groups each nation were in, and try to map out who had difficult paths. Unfortunately, we won’t have groups until later this year, for a tournament that will be played in Qatar in November and December. I don’t have a big analytical take on how to approach World Cup, but it’s always a fun event, and I like taking a top nation so I have a rooting interest. Failing that in my first draft, I took Uruguay, who are not a lock to get into the tournament, which I felt might be making them a decent bet relative to their relative strength. For Omnifantasy, I don’t really care if my team misses the tournament altogether, are unable to advance out of the group stage, or loses in the first knockout round — all results will net zero Omnifantasy points. So I decided to intentionally target a nation that hasn’t yet qualified and is perhaps discounted as a result.
F1
By popular demand, we’ve added Formula 1 this year. I can’t say I’m a fan of how it will play out for Omnifantasy, as the scoring is a full season of results with no playoff format. Many of its fans have noted to me that new cars this year could shake up the standings, but it’s a matter of how far the standings need to be shaken up.
Lewis Hamilton has finished first every year since 2014, save for 2016 and 2021, where he narrowly finished second twice. The top three has been the same three drivers each of the past three years, with different orders, while the guy who finished fourth in 2020 finished fourth again in 2021, and the guy who finished fifth in 2021 was sixth back in 2020.
And again, this is because the results are determined by the aggregation of all the races, which is like how we do golf and tennis but with far more margin for error. Last year, Hamilton and Max Verstappen, who won F1, finished 1-2 in some order in 15 of 22 races. They combined to win 18 of 22 races. So even if the new cars shake things up quite a bit, that could just mean some of the back-of-the-pack drivers have a real shot to compete to win given races, but that over the course of the season we’re still seeing the cream rise to the top.
I’m not doubting those of you who have told me F1 will be different this year, and it perhaps won’t be so dominated by the top few drafters, but there is a long, long way to go to where someone like Hamilton or Verstappen doesn’t feel like a virtual lock to finish in the top five overall, and really I should say the top two but I’m just trying to drive home the point. If it were up to me, I wouldn’t have F1 in any of my leagues, but one of the things about Omnifantasy is no one pick can win you a league, and in a couple drafts I’ve done with F1 so far the top three drivers have all gone very high, which does push down top picks in other sports to those picking at the back of the first round.
So it’s maybe not all bad, and I should also note I have no idea if the end results will be as much of a foregone conclusion as I suspect they might be. We’ll see what it adds in 2022, but F1 is a great example where the third or fourth driver is probably winding up overdrafted relative to their chances of finishing first, so for people who don’t get a top pick, there’s some value it brings in terms of pushing down picks that may have fewer Expected Points but better odds at the 80.
Alright, that’s all I have today. If you want to get in on this year’s Omnifantasy Cup, drafts will start Thursday. Sign up here.