Fantasy Football Draft Season Heats Up: Two Guides Offer Distinct Approaches
As fantasy football draft season reaches its peak, two new guides aim to help managers build winning rosters, each tailored to a different draft format. CBS Sports has published a round-by-round strategy for traditional snake drafts, emphasizing flexibility and a plan from any draft slot. Meanwhile, Sports Illustrated offers a printable cheat sheet with fair value dollar amounts for auction leagues, which have typically operate with a $200 starting budget.
CBS Sports: A Flexible Blueprint for Snake Drafts
CBS Sports' approach revolves around having a plan but being willing to adapt when a draft doesn't go as expected. The guide covers strategy for every pick from No. 1 through 12, recommending that if you have the first or second pick, you should draft Jahmyr Gibbs or Bijan Robinson, in that order. Gibbs is expected to be dominant with the departure of David Montgomery from Detroit, while Robinson looks to build off an exceptional 2025 campaign with Tyler Allgeier gone from Atlanta.
In subsequent rounds, the advice suggests targeting two receivers or a receiver and a tight end like Brock Bowers or Trey McBride, with receiver options based on CBS Sports Average Draft Position including Rashee Rice, Nico Collins, Chris Olave, and Malik Nabers. The guide also mentions potential reach-up running backs, such as Kyren Williams, Josh Jacobs, or Jeremiyah Love.
The CBS Sports strategy highlights the importance of patience: no at reaching for running backs early if better values remain, and the recommendation to wait on quarterback until later. It also suggests taking late-round flyers on running backs, particularly in formats that allow depth. The article notes that drafts may deviate from average draft position, so adjust accordingly.
Injury updates are included, particularly that Ashton Jeanty suffered an ankle injury on Aug. 23, leaving his status uncertain for early rounds. The guide also notes Alvin Kamara is dealing with a knee injury, and Travis Kelce will turn 37 in October, factors that could influence roster decisions.
Sports Illustrated: Dollar Values for Auction Leagues
For those in auction formats, Sports Illustrated provides a cheat sheet built on a $200 starting budget, with fair value expressed both as dollar amounts and percentages of the bankroll. Bijan Robinson leads the rankings at running back, ahead of Jahmyr Gibbs and Christian McCaffrey, and is assigned a fair value of $76 or 38% of the budget; the piece advises not to spend beyond that. In the ranking, Robinson's value falls above Gibbs, whom the author believes the consensus is too high on – a notable departure from CBS's top-two status.
Christian McCaffrey, despite being capable of loading up a 400-touch season and fitting as the author's RB1 when assuming seventeen games, is flagged as a high re-injury risk, an elevated mark of 0 on their ratings scale. This was medium devaluation still keeps him ahead of Gibbs. Chris Olave, conversely, has had some hype, but the analysts label him as a dollar-store wing with an injury risk rating; he drops from WR8 when healthy to WR11 in the auction chart, worth 5% of the bankroll in fair value.
For quarterbacks, Josh Allen is highlighted as commanding a substantial edge: he projects for nearly three more fantasy points per game than any other signal-caller, justifying a price of 19% of your budget.
On the budget-buy side, the low-cost strategy section suggests focusing on high-upside, safe picks rather than cheaper, high-risk players. It gives an example of Tank Dell, who is worth $5 in fair value, but the author finds his value-over-replacement too low and recommends other, less risky options around that price point.
The SI guide also offers printable cheat sheets at the bottom of its page for PPR, Half-PPR, and Standard scoring leagues, tailored to the auction format, with these drafts typically using a $200 salary cap.
Choose Your Draft's Path
Draft managers now have two distinct resources to get ready for the season: CBS Sports for the classical snake-draft experience, with its strategies like Zero RB, Hero RB, or Robust RB, and Sports Illustrated for auction-specific dollar values and risk-mitigated ratings. Both share a common theme of advice—flexibility—and both are designed to help you build a championship-caliber roster in your respective format.