2025 Fantasy Draft Strategy: When to Take High-Upside Shots

Every year in fantasy football, we hear that in the later rounds of drafts, we need to “take the shot” or “swing for the fences”. Sure, Player X is safe, but you know he’s only going to get you so far. Instead, you should take Player Y and hope you strike gold, because finding that upside could give your team a big boost.

But when exactly should we start looking to do so? It’s never quite been told, or at least to my knowledge. Naturally, I wanted to find out so I can share it with you all. That’s exactly what we’re exploring today and we’re going to get right to it.

Study Parameters

To find out the answer, I went to FantasyPros and pulled ADP and fantasy finish data from 2020 to 2024. For a player to be a part of our data set, they must have a minimum of eight games in a season. They also need to be drafted in the top 16 rounds of fantasy drafts, also known as an ADP of 192. We are also looking at only skill position players; kickers and defenses are not part of our data.

When playing fantasy football, we want to make sure that at the top of the draft, we are grabbing known stars. But as the draft progresses, we’re often faced with the choice of whether to grab a player who is safe or a player with potential upside. Someone who finishes as the WR50 might have some good games, but he’s not really helping my roster week in week out. I want to draft someone I believe can actually start for my team. And in general, a low-end WR3, a.k.a. a flex play, scores an average of 12 PPR PPG. That is the baseline we’re going to be using, someone who I can see being at least a flex play, if not better. I’m not concerned with safety in a pick in the later rounds, I want to see if I can snag a true starter or even a difference maker for my team.

The Findings

So, at what point do I start taking that approach? Based on our data set, among the top 84 picks (pick 84 is the end of Round 7 in drafts) about 74% will hit an average of 12 PPG but after pick 84, that rate drops to only 34%. 📉 

“But wait,” you might ask, “the top seven rounds are usually filled with fantasy football studs, and the later rounds are guys that are mainly used to fill out our roster. Of course the hit rate is better towards the top. Why round seven?”

Here is why. I went and I explored every pick taken in each round, and Rounds 6 and 7 are where hit rates change from overwhelmingly positive to 50/50. In Round 8, the hit rate of players who hit 12 or more points per game drops to 40%. The same goes for Round 9, but by the time you get to Round 10, that rate has fallen to 30%.

🔎 But let’s take things a step further. The data that I’ve mentioned so far includes every skill position. Let’s narrow this down to just running backs and wide receivers since they make up the majority of a starting roster. In Round 7, you have a 43% chance at a starting-level player. In Round 8, that number drops to just 27%! Nine has an interesting jump back up to 39%, but ten goes straight back down to less than 21%. Instead of listing off the hit rate of every round for RB and WR, let’s just take a peek at this chart:

Obviously, the top four rounds are far and away the best for running back and receiver. But Round 5 is still too early to “call your shot” because a lot of good usable players are still on the board. If you take out the first four rounds and just compare Rounds 5-7 vs 8-10, the hit rate is 49% vs 31%. That’s essentially a coin flip vs a less than one in three chance! 🤯 

If you want to take things up a notch, while Round 7 is where the “cutoff” is for flex-level players, it is not for higher-level potential. When you bump up what you’re looking for to RB/WR2 level, about 14+ PPG, you actually have a slightly better chance of hitting on someone in Rounds 8-9 than Round 7. Before the end of Round 9, players will hit a RB/WR2 level 49% of the time. After Round 9, it plummets to only 10%. That is a massive drop-off!

Quarterback ADP and a Quick Data Lesson

In a different article, I tackled the tight end and quarterback position, so I won’t go into much detail here with those positions. However, I did want to bring you some info, showing you the positional advantage a drafting an elite QB by ADP can give you. It also shows how scoring flattens out vs ADP later on, so you can afford to wait a little on a QB if you miss a top-tier player:

While the gap between someone like the ADP QB4 and QB10 may look wide, it’s not as crazy as what the chart may make it appear, about 2-3 PPG (which in fantasy is a good bit, to be clear). There is an advantage to drafting an elite QB, and the chart above does a good job of showing that. It’s also formatted this way so that you’re not having to look at a chart that starts at 0 PPG and has incredibly long bars. If I did that and we weren’t careful, we might wonder why the heck you would draft Josh Allen anyway, because the advantage of having Allen wouldn’t show up as well. For the heck of it, here’s what that chart would look like:

The change in PPG doesn’t look quite as stark, does it? Always be mindful of how data is presented, be it from me or anyone else, fantasy football space or otherwise.

Where Do We Go From Here?

How shall we apply what we learned? Well, I wanted to give you some examples, so I hopped in and did a mock draft in Sleeper at the ten spot. I selected fairly close to ADP for the first few rounds, getting the Raider duo of Asthon Jeanty, Jaxon Smith-Njigba, and Jalen Hurts. Rookies Travis Hunter and Kaleb Johnson were also a part of my squad that got me through Round 7.

⚒️ But then Round 8 came. Did I want to go with Najee Harris, Jayden Reed, Bradon Aiyuk, or Matthew Golden? Or did I want to take the upside shot at Jauan Jennings after his breakout last year? I went Jennings. I selected Josh Downs ahead of ADP in Round 9 as well because of my belief in his peripheral stats.

Rounds 10 and 11 were much the same story. In Round 10, I could choose between Tank Bigsby, Rashid Shaheed, Jayden Higgins, and Tucker Kraft. Why not go for the big man in Buffalo, Keon Coleman? Offseason praise only means so much, but if it’s true he’s put in the work, could we see a Mike Evans-lite season from him? 🦬 

🏴‍☠️ Then I needed a running back, and while he might be deemed a bit “safe,” Rachaad White was on the board in Round 11, the man’s got flex appeal already and room for a lot more if Bucky Irving goes down.

Finally, in Round 14, things are a bit bare. Braelon Allen, Josh Palmer, Quentin Johnston, Jaylen Wright (whom I like this year), and Wan’Dale Robinson are available. But why not take a shot at Jalen Coker, who showed out in some limited work last year? Sure, Tet McMillan is there, but fellow sophomore teammate Xavier Legette wasn’t as efficient as Coker. In fact, removing the game he played only 7 snaps, his 17-game pace would have been 54 receptions for 813 yards and three scores. Can he build off of an under-the-radar rookie year? 🐈‍⬛

➡️ ➡️ All in all, it’s important to remember that while Round 7 seems to be the drop-off for starter/flex level players and Round 9 for higher-end (odd as that was), it’s important not to treat this as a hard and fast rule. Every draft comes with context. Every pick is influenced by the picks before. Just because you’re in Round 10 doesn’t mean you need to grab someone you can probably get four rounds later just because you want to “take the shot”. It just means you have some flexibility and breathing room. Early in drafts, I stick close to ADP. As it goes on, I loosen up a bit and take the guys I like the most within a certain range. And based on the data we looked at, it looks like Round 8 is where I can start to have that freedom, and that finding panned out in my mock draft.

Apply this yourself! See if you feel the same way in mocks. Give it a shot. You won’t know until you try! With that, I will see you next time.