Training camp stories are all about hype and hoopla, innuendoes, and misinformation. There are many reasons for this, from having open competitions for different positions to throwing off competitors’ evaluations of each NFL roster. 

Unfortunately for fantasy owners, these psyops (Psychological Operations) can be misleading, making fantasy owners buy into the hype and make draft decisions that end up as disasters. 

Take the news on Carson Wentz of the Indianapolis Colts as an example. Recently it was revealed that Wentz suffered an injury in one of his feet that required surgery that carries a 5-12 week recovery time. Without a starting quarterback, playoff-hopeful Indy will struggle.

The rumor mill began almost immediately with possible trades for Wentz’s backup (and Superbowl MVP) in Philly, Nick Foles.  Or take the speculation of Philip Rivers coming out of retirement to play for a team that has the right mixture of opportunity and playoff opportunity. 

Of course, this sent the hopeful in Indy to assume that Rivers was referring to the Colts before Rivers retracted his comments stating that he enjoys coaching right now at the High School level and post-season he’d consider a possible return. 

Avoid Pre-Draft Injury And Roster Cuts

Another issue with training camp is the inevitable season-ending or long-term injuries that can sideline a player and a team. Still, there are the training camp cuts of veterans and rookies that you may have your sights set on and for those reasons alone is why having your fantasy league draft after final NFL team rosters are set, sometime around Labor Day. 

As you collect all the data you plan to use for your fantasy league drafts, from player rankings to mock drafts, another key to consider is a fantasy football team analyzer during your mock draft. A tool such as a team analyzer can show you holes in your team’s scoring potential and guide you to field the best lineups based on matchups once the season begins.  

Analytics As A Way Of Fantasy Life

To maximize your roster’s potential, you need to analyze your lineup every week. From matchups to performance, roles and injuries can all impact your team’s performance. 

The way analytics work is through examining matchups and recent trends before assigning a positive or negative projection for each position on your roster. 

You may have had a good couple of weeks for your players, but you may be entering a matchup nightmare for certain positions, and the analyzer will reveal to you whether you should ride out your WR2 and RB2 or whether you need to make a couple of roster adjustments. 

The benefit of using a team analyzer tool is obvious, and it will show you week-by-week projections for your roster versus opponents showing holes in scoring that you may have missed.

Leverage The Waiver Wire 

Another thing to consider with your fantasy football strategy is how you crawl the waiver wire for players that may be overperforming, dropped due to short-term needs of other owners in the league, and simply may add roster depth or matchup advantages week by week. 

With an analyzer tool, you can enter possible waiver wire pickups into lineups and see how they may perform before putting a claim on them. This will give you insights into whether the player on waivers is a worthy addition to pick up or whether they were a flash in the pan that had a good week or two.

Before diving into the waiver wire and upend your entire roster, you need to grasp the waiver priority for your league. 

Some league settings give priority on the waiver to teams with losing records. Others are set up to do a snake based on who placed waivers every week. Others still are ranked by draft order. So look up the priority for your league before placing any waiver on a player so that it’s not a wasted opportunity. 

Putting together the best fantasy roster is challenging. It takes a ton of research and a little luck to win a fantasy season. Using all the tools at your disposal, such as pre-draft rankings, current NFL roster trends, matchups, injuries, and performance, as well as cherry-picking the waiver wire, all take considerable time. 

Using a tool that can analyze all your potential moves and pickups and show you week-by-week scoring can give your team a massive advantage for the season, and for that reason, you should consider utilizing one.