Choosing the Right Quarterback

by Derek Farnsworth (Notorious) Last Updated 2019-08-08 03:30:20 Premium Content Part of the product Notorious’ Blueprint to Weekly Fantasy Football

It’s funny how weekly fantasy football strategy changes each and every season. As little as two years ago, the common strategy in DFS was to pay up for quarterbacks. In a vacuum, the reasoning was sound. The argument was that a quarterback is the most consistent position in fantasy football (which is true) and because of that we should pay up for the consistent position in order to guarantee ourselves a high fantasy output per dollar spent.

The missing link to that argument is the consequences of paying up for a quarterback. Since we have salary cap restraints, paying up for a quarterback leaves us with less cap room to spend on the more inconsistent positions, primarily wide receivers. In terms of week-to-week consistency, quarterbacks have the most consistent production, followed then by running backs, wide receivers, and tight ends. Can you figure out the pattern in that grouping? The fewer touches a player has, the more inconsistent he is week to week.

As football continues to evolve into a more pass-heavy style of play, we continuously see more and more good outings from mediocre and subpar quarterbacks. Since we know that the quarterback position is the most consistent, why not pay down at the position that is consistent and pay up at the positions that are the most inconsistent?

I generally don’t like to pay a premium for quarterbacks in cash games. That doesn’t mean that we can never employ this strategy (there could be an immense number of value running backs that allow us to pay up at quarterback), but typically I like to save a little cap space at the position.

Now that we’ve covered the general strategy for quarterbacks in terms of pricing, let’s get into the fun stuff. The three most important attributes to look for in a quarterback are opportunity, matchup, and salary.