The Overlooked Best Ball Strategy You Need To Start Using

Best ball isn’t just a rapidly growing fantasy football format, it’s also one of the most studied games in the entire fantasy space. Give a bunch of football nerds a game they’re this passionate about and a seven-month offseason and watch them (us?) go! As a result, there are plenty of already-identified winning strategies.

Since you clicked on an article about an “Overlooked” strategy, you’re probably familiar with most of them — stacking games in Week 17, paying attention to bye weeks, Hero/Zero RB, etc. As the tournaments get larger and the field gets sharper, we must find winning strategies that the field hasn’t caught onto yet. This article is about my favorite one — drafting teammates outside of my stacks.

The concept begins with one of the more frustrating aspects of best ball. One week, it’s like every one of your guys was shot out of a cannon. Good luck keeping any of them from scoring 15 points! The next, it’s like they all gave each other COVID-19. 

“If only I could take the two 20-point performances from my bench last week and apply them to this week!” You can’t, great bench performances don’t carry over, so there’s nothing you can do to help make sure all your players’ spike weeks and down weeks don’t overlap… or is there?

When we stack, the thing we’re trying to introduce into our lineups is positive correlation. I’m here to argue that inverse correlation is just as important. 

Let’s play a game. Who am I?

It’s a trick question. It’s actually the 2023 best ball score of two teammates, Nico Collins and Tank Dell. Let’s play again. Who am I now?

This is the best ball score of Tank Dell and Davante Adams. Importantly, Adams was the WR10. Collins was WR12. And yet, Dell and Collins were over 23 points better than Dell and Adams. This is the power of inverse correlation. Dell and Collins are less likely to spike in the same week, which also means they’re less likely to dud in the same week (other than their bye). One of the most frustrating aspects of best ball is that you can have big scores on your bench one week, then multiple bad scores in your lineup the next. For example, you could have six receivers score at least 15 PPR points one week, then just one the next. 

Sure enough, Dell and Adams had some of their best games in the same week. When Adams exploded for 42.2 PPR points in Week 3, Dell went 5-145-1 (receptions — yards — TDs). When Dell posted 28.9 PPR points in Week 11, Adams went 7-82-1. Dell and Collins combined for eight 20-plus-PPR-point weeks. Dell and Adams combined for just six. Dell and Collins had four weeks under 10 PPR points, Dell and Adams had five. By drafting teammates and introducing some inverse correlation, we can help stabilize the number of great performers in our lineup each week, instead of having a surplus one week and a shortage the next.

WR Teammate Targets

Importantly, not all teammates are inversely correlated to the same degree. For the most inverse correlation, we want to attack specific player types and at the receiver position, that means big-play ability players (like Collins and Dell!). Think about it — when Dell catches a 40-yard TD, that’s half a drive that Collins loses. He can’t catch any more passes and can’t score the TD himself. So, the big-play teammates that I’m targeting the most for inverse correlation in best ball are:

1. Marquise Brown/Xavier Worthy, KC
2. Nico Collins/Stefon Diggs/Tank Dell, HOU
3. Terry McLaurin/Jahan Dotson, WAS
4. DeAndre Hopkins/Calvin Ridley, TEN
5. Drake London/Darnell Mooney, ATL
6. Garrett Wilson/Mike Williams, NYJ
7. Justin Jefferson/Jordan Addison, MIN
8. DK Metcalf/Tyler Lockett or DK Metcalf/Jaxon Smith-Njigba, SEA
9. Christian Watson/Jayden Reed/Dontayvion Wicks, GB
10. George Pickens/Brandon Aiyuk (in case Aiyuk gets traded to PIT — need Aiyuk’s ADP to fall first before this one becomes a priority for me)
11. Deebo Samuel/George Kittle, SF (already a priority for me because if Aiyuk gets traded, their ADPs will skyrocket more than they already have)

RB Teammate Targets

Like receivers, we also want to find specific archetypes of RB teammates to maximize the inverse correlation. My favorite type of pairing includes one back who succeeds in negative, pass-happy game scripts while the other succeeds when playing with a lead. We can also look for teams where the TDs are going to be tough to predict on a week-to-week basis.

1. Jahmyr Gibbs/David Montgomery, DET
2. Najee Harris/Jaylen Warren, PIT
3. James Cook/Ray Davis, BUF
4. Rhamondre Stevenson/Antonio Gibson, NE
5. Khalil Herbert/Roschon Johnson, CHI (I don’t believe in D’Andre Swift’s “talent”)
6. Chase Brown/Zack Moss, CIN
7. James Conner/Trey Benson, ARI
8. Gus Edwards/J.K. Dobbins or Gus Edwards/Kimani Vidal, LAC
9. Tony Pollard/Tyjae Spears, TEN (This one is probably better than No. 9, but I’m not as confident about who will have what role as I am in the other backfields)
10. Austin Ekeler/Brian Robinson Jr., WAS

Final Thoughts

This is the type of thing I believe can create a genuine, significant edge in best ball. Stacking in Week 17, for example, is great, but people know about it and are doing it at scale. It’s not just about finding strategies that make sense, it’s about finding the winning strategies that few others are using. For now, this is my favorite such best ball strategy. If you want to know the strategies we’re using for DFS that few others are (of which there are many!), make sure you check out our DFS plans, which include our red-hot GPP Scores and brand new StatsHub/DVOA tools.