Mahomes, Chubb, Fields highlight 12-team Best Ball Draft roster

While the 2023 NFL regular season is still a handful of months away, that doesn’t mean you have to wait until then to start looking into fantasy football. While redraft leagues will likely have their drafts starting closer to the end of summer or the start of fall, the other year-round fantasy football options would be a dynasty or best ball leagues.

Best ball drafts don’t require you to set any lineups; they are done automatically each week based on who performed the best in your lineups. There are no waiver wire moves and no trades. Best ball leagues typically feature deeper rosters to make up for the lack of change throughout the season. These typically consist of one quarterback, two running backs, three wide receivers, a tight end, an RB/WR flex and 12 bench spots.

DraftKings DFS offers a variety of best ball formats that will officially start in August. There are leagues as small as three teams and as large as tens of thousands. Most drafts will begin when they are filled, so you either need to have email notifications on or be present when they start, or you will auto draft. Also, as a heads-up, there isn’t an audio notification during the draft that you are on the clock, so you will want to keep an eye on it.

I conducted a 12-team best ball draft on DraftKings. The draft order was randomized at the beginning, and I ended up with the 11th pick.

Best picks

11. Patrick Mahomes
14. Nick Chubb
38. Justin Fields
59. Darren Waller

In redraft fantasy football leagues, you typically go a few rounds before seeing a quarterback selected. I went ahead and ripped the bandaid off with the 11th pick. Mahomes continues to show that he is a fantasy football cheat code and has as good of a chance as anyone to put forth top performances consistently. At the time of this writing, the Cleveland Browns haven’t re-signed Kareem Hunt and have yet to add a dominant running back to offset Nick Chubb. Grabbing him at 14 gave me a solid foundation at running back for the draft.

Is there any more boom or bust player than Justin Fields? His rushing ability gives him a ton of upside, and Chicago actually upgraded its pass catchers, making me think he will boom. When Daniel Jones was re-signed, he was given a chance to prove himself to the New York Giants. The team traded for Darren Waller, who I think sees a large target share.

Worst picks

107. JuJu Smith-Schuster
134. Elijah Moore
230. Kyle Trask

I don't think there is anything wrong with taking Smith-Schuster or Moore where I did. The problem was with my roster construction, and now having hindsight. One of these spots should have been to upgrade at running back. At 107, I could have taken Jamaal Williams; at 134, I could have had D’Onta Foreman. The latter isn’t a huge miss, but each has more upside than some of my depth running backs.

With my final pick in the draft, I chose Kyle Trask. He has a shot at being the starting quarterback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, but I didn’t need him and threw away this pick. I could have selected Allen Robinson II, DeVante Parker or Mack Hollins, who are more likely to have profitable seasons.

My team

QB

Patrick Mahomes
Justin Fields
Trey Lance
Kyle Trask

RB

Nick Chubb
Isiah Pacheco
Javonte Williams
Damien Harris
Jeff Wilson Jr.
Chase Edmonds

WR

Tee Higgins
Brandon Aiyuk
JuJu Smith-Schuster
Elijah Moore
Mecole Hardman Jr.
Josh Downs

TE

Darren Waller
Dalton Schultz
Juwan Johnson
Hayden Hurst