Hello, everybody.

Welcome into the Fantasy Pros Football Podcast. I'm Ryan Warmly, joined by Derek Brown and by Jake Sealy from The Athletic. Lots of shows together this week, guys, so I feel like I've seen you a bunch. I already know that you guys are doing well. You guys already know that I wasn't doing well, but doing a little bit better. Now that I got a portable AC unit in my house, I could survive the heat a little bit better. It was 87 degrees last night. We already talked about this yesterday. I won't bore anybody with any more details. It was a struggle, though. So thankfully, doing a little bit better now that I have a temporary portable AC unit here. Today, we are talking about some unwritten rules to winning 2026 drafts, although I guess they are now written because we wrote them down into the

sheet. But generally, just kind of rules that we want to live by when drafting this year,

less about specific players and more about just general approaches and philosophies. And like I said,

rules we're going to kind of abide by. Reminder for everybody, all of our 2026 consensus

rankings and tiers can be found at fantasy pros.com slash rankings. We've broken this down by different stages of the draft. So we have a couple for the early rounds, a couple for the mid to late rounds, and then sort of one golden rule that we don't want to get off of. You guys have two for each of these. I have one for each of these. So we've got a lot to get through. We'll go ahead and start right now. Debrough, what is your first tip for the early rounds?

Man, I think, like, especially in the year of our Lord where running back, running back is the

premier start for a lot of people because the age of the running back is back. My first rule is

you can walk out of the first five rounds with only two running backs.

Now, and a lot of, and again, when we give these blanket kind of rules, a lot of people are like, that's not actionable. Like, what am I supposed to do with that? Like, I understand a lot of people are going to start their drafts running back, running back. But I think it's just as feasible to start with two wide receivers. I know that's blasphemy this year and everybody is all in on running backs.

But if you're going to start out with two wide receivers. I know that's blasphemy this year, and everybody is all in on running backs. But if you're going to start out with two wide receivers, I think it's possible and easy to catch up in running backs in rounds three through five or go premium tight in, like wide receiver, wide receiver and then tight end. And I'll even give you some targets. In round three, the two guys I'll be targeting, Breece Hall and Javante Williams, round four, Cam Scadaboo and David Montgomery, round five, DeAndre Swift and Bachel Tootin. And I think that looking at different team builds and being flexible to the room while also addressing running back is paramount. Yeah, Jake, what do you think about this? When you're thinking about the early rounds, how much are you thinking specifically about, I want to hit these positions? I want to hit two running backs or one or zero or I want to get X number of receivers.

Positionally, what's your thought in these early rounds as you build out the foundations of your team?

Yeah, I couldn't agree more.

And I don't want to say I hate this question because I hate like, I don't want you to ask me this, not you, the people listening. It's not that I hate that you ask me this. I hate it because of where your thought process is going when people say, hey, I plan to take blank and blank in the first two rounds. What should I do in round three? And that's the reason I hate it is because you're doing yourself a disservice.

You don't know how the draft is going to fall to you. And by having what Debrose talking about too is like a predetermined strategy of like, I got to get my running back in round three. And then you throw away potential huge value on the board because you had this preset strategy of like what you need to do, how you expected the draft to fall. And I feel like that's one of the biggest traps people will see. And like, you know, for people who might be QB early, which is okay. But they're like, oh, I need to go. And I look at drafts and people send me this in like, Hey, week one, I'm struggling. I'm like, what, what rounds? Did you, did you skip the first two rounds?

And I'm not saying, like, again, I'm not trying to be a jerk.

It's just, it's, I'm struggling. I'm like, what rounds? Did you, did you skip the first two rounds?

And I'm not saying, like, again, I'm not trying to be a jerk. It's just, it's because they went in with a strategy. They overdrafted a running back. They overdrafted a quarterback. And then by the time you get to it, you actually have no values on your roster. Yeah, and I do agree with you. I ask the question because I know it's something that, it's a question I get a lot from, you know, listeners.

Obviously, you do too, which is why I asked it to you. But I'm very much on the same page with you as I don't like things through that mindset. Although I will say, you know, I was planning to do my tip in each of these sections at the end. I'm actually going to do mine for this early rounds now because it ties in a little. But mine is wide receiver isn't as deep as its reputation. So get some building blocks early. It's not as specific as you need to get X number of receivers in X number of early rounds. But more just don't go in thinking, well, wide receiver is always crazy deep. It's never not deep. And it is deep. I just don't think it's quite as deep as

like its reputation would suggest. So I want to make sure I have some building blocks early there. And that's obviously going to apply in these early rounds. So I don't, I don't want to put a specific number to it, Jake, or a specific round to it. But I don't want to come out of these early rounds feeling like I'm, oh, it doesn't matter if I'm really weak at receiver because I can just catch up later.

I don't think it's as feasible as people maybe talk about it to be. What do you think about that, Jake? I completely agree. And I'm not going to go much further because I'll let Debrot talk because I'm really trying not to spill into mine. And there's so much like it really ties into everything we're saying so far. So I'll let Debril go a little bit further. I'm saving a little bit of what I want to talk about.

Totally. there's so much like it really ties into everything we're saying so far so like i'll let d bro go a little bit

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