The fantasy football season is almost here. It’s that time of the season where managers are busy strategizing and planning for their fantasy football drafts. The most popular way to draft a fantasy football team is via the snake drafts.
In recent years, the concept of auction drafts have been on the rise. More and more fantasy football managers are leaning towards auction.
If you’re someone who’s never participated in fantasy football, and want to understand the concept of auction drafts, look no further. This page will explain everything about auctions.
Also Read: How many rounds are there in the NFL draft?
What is an Auction Draft in fantasy football?
As the name suggests, auction draft is a fantasy football draft where the managers get to bid on the players while operating on a budget. The highest bidder gets to draft that player.
Snake drafts are usually how most fantasy managers tend to draft their players. In snake drafts, the order for the draft is set and managers have to choose in the predetermined order.
While in the auction drafts, the fantasy football managers have the chance to draft any player using their budget.
One of the reasons why auction drafts are gaining more popularity is the fact that auction allows fantasy managers to pick any player of their choice, if they’re within the budget. This opens up the options for the manager to construct a roster and build a team which is best suited to win rather than being pressured by the draft position.
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Read More: What time is the 2025 NFL Draft?
How does Auction Draft work in fantasy football?
In auction drafts, the bidding process opens up for teams when teams nominate the players to bid. Once a team nominates a player, the competition to acquire the player begins. The whole league then sets out to bid for the player, if interested. This also includes the team who nominated the player for the bidding process.
The team nominating the player sets the opening bid. And it usually begins from $1. The opening bid from the nominator can also go higher depending on the player. But in cases when the value isn’t set, the bid begins at $1. The nomination and bidding process allows teams to equally compete for any player at any given point in the auction process.
Every team in the auction draft has a standard budget of $200 to finish setting up their 16-man roster. Unlike snake drafts, the best players may not necessarily be nominated early in the draft process. Hence the managers will have to be wise in spending from their budget.
Allocation of this $200 is important for the managers to land top players in the draft. The goal of auctions for managers is to get high quality players at a cheap and affordable budget.
One of the things to understand during an auction is the concept of spending power. Because the manager is spending out of a limited budget and there is a ceiling, chances are that later on, they may not be able to afford the player of their liking due to budget constraints.
Thus knowing to spend the $200 budget without having to overspend and underspend is very crucial in nailing the auction draft.
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FAQs
A. Auction draft is where teams compete against each other via bidding to acquire particular player.
A. In Snake drafts, teams select players through a predetermined drafting order. After a round is completed, the order is then reversed.
A. Bids and offers are usually the amount a team is willing to use to acquire a player, while operating under the budget.
A. There is no one size fits all strategy. However there are a few basic principles to approach auction draft - Understand and allocate budget, do not overspend, it’s okay to get outbid, monitor your competitors, nomination is the key.
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