Shawn Siegele goes through the last five rookie drafts and explores what each draft would look like if it took place today.
It’s always fun to go back and ask the question What if? It can also help us calibrate our expectations for the future. What should be the core of our dynasty startup teams? What is the hit rate for rookie picks? How well do rookies hold trade value?
Last week, I used the Dynasty ADP tool to investigate whether rookie buzz created an opening to buy veteran RBs. Today, we’ll use it to examine each of the last five rookie drafts.
As I re-draft for each rookie season, I’ll be using the following criteria:
- Points scored for original dynasty owners
- Retention of trade value for original dynasty owners
- Current fantasy value in 2020
- Expectation of future trade value as the player continues to age
- Positional value
“Who would you have preferred to draft?” and “Who would you prefer to own now?” are slightly different questions. Our emphasis in rookie drafts is on the former, but the latter still holds relevance.
As we re-pick every rookie draft since 2015, we’ll look at where our staff selections hit and where they missed. I’ll also highlight my most controversial current choice in each draft, and you can decide whether I’m making a bad pick even though I have the luxury of knowing what happened. Finally, we’ll examine all five drafts as a whole and look for exploitable opportunities that may exist in 2020 and beyond.
